Wright brothers-inspired planes in other crashes

At least four crashes reported in the last decade.

Timothy R. Gaffney Wright "B" Flyer Inc.'s "Silver Bird" makes its first formal test flight last month at Springfield Beckley Airport with Don Gum in left seat and Don Stroud in right seat. The flight lasted 34 minutes and reached an altitude of 4,300 feet.

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By Dave Larsen, Staff Writer Updated 11:43 PM Saturday, July 30, 2011

The crash of a Wright “B” Flyer on Saturday that killed two people was not the first crash involving a Wright brothers-inspired airplane built by aviation enthusiasts.

There have been at least four other crashes in the last decade of replicas or reproduction Wright brothers planes, including one in the Dayton area that left a man seriously injured.

The plane in Saturday’s fatal crash, known as “Silver Bird,” was a flyable look-alike of Wilbur and Orville Wright’s first production aircraft, the Wright Model B Flyer. It was designed and built by volunteers from Wright “B” Flyer Inc., a nonprofit organization based at Dayton-Wright Brothers Airport in Miami Twp.

“These are look-alikes built to Federal Aviation Administration safety standards with modern engines and instrumentation,” said Phil Beaudoin, the group’s president. The plane had been approved for its test flight program by the FAA, he said.

The “Silver Bird” made its first formal test flight last month at Springfield Beckley Airport with Don Gum as one of its pilots. Gum and Mitchell Cary were identified as the pilots who died in Saturday’s crash.

The plane was dubbed the “Silver Bird” because of its silver-painted steel frame. It was designed to be taken apart easily, shipped and reassembled for flying displays around the world.

The original Wright B, manufactured at the Wright Co. factory in Dayton from 1910-11, saw service in the U.S. Army and civilian enterprises.

A replica of the 1905 Wright Flyer III crashed Oct. 1, 2009 during a practice flight at Huffman Prairie at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. Pilot and builder Mark Dusenberry of Dover was taken by helicopter ambulance to Miami Valley Hospital in critical condition. Hospital officials did not release any details of his injuries or recovery.

Dusenberry was practicing for a re-enactment of the Wright brothers’ historic demonstration of practical flight when he crashed.

Dusenberry and the plane also went down during an Oct. 5, 2007, re-enactment flight at Huffman Prairie. He escaped injury in that incident.

In November 2003, a replica of the 1903 Wright Flyer crashed in North Carolina during a practice takeoff for ceremonies celebrating the centennial of flight, according to the Los Angeles Times. The pilot was not injured in the crash.

That plane was built by Ken Hyde of the Wright Experience in Warrenton, Va. Hyde suffered a broken arm in May 2003 when he crashed a 1911 reproduction Wright Model B into a tree.

The first fatal airplane crash on July 2, 1908, involved a plane piloted by Orville Wright at Fort Myer, Va. Wright was badly injured and his passenger, Lt. Thomas Selfridge, was killed.

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2419 or dlarsen@DaytonDailyNews.com.

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