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August 15, 2000 - Plane Lands On Top Of Truck
CHILOQUIN, Oregon (USA) - It was a near-perfect stop at a truck top.
A 63-year-old California man was lucky to be alive after he crash-landed his
small plane on top of a flatbed truck on U.S. 97.
Howard Aaron Hamer had just taken off from the airport on Thursday in the
tiny high desert town of Chiloquin when his single-engine plane lost power,
according to the Oregon State Police.
He decided to try to make an emergency landing northbound on U.S. 97, which
runs a fairly straight course along the sparsely populated east side of the
Cascade Range.
At the same time, the driver of a flatbed truck -- also traveling north --
came up under Hamer's plane without realizing it.
Police said the plane's propeller snagged on the sleeper of the truck. The
nose of the aircraft remained on the sleeper berth, while the tail crashed
down onto the empty flatbed trailer.
Both Hamer, who lives in Nevada City, Calif., and the truck driver, Filiberto
Corona Ambriz of Arbuckle, Calif., were not injured.
Hamer said he never saw the truck until the impact, probably because he was
watching southbound traffic and was trying to keep the nose of the aircraft
up.
Ambriz also said he was unaware of the plane until he felt a bump and heard a
loud bang.
Hamer built the Lancer 235 aircraft and has flown it for 10 years.
