What's the story behind Lynyrd Skynyrd's plane crash?!
Question: What's the story behind Lynyrd Skynyrd's plane crash!?
Anything you know @ the song Free Bird would be appreciated as well!. I just really like that song!. The guitar is amazing!. Www@Enter-QA@Com
Answers:
On Thursday, October 20, 1977, just three days after the release of Street Survivors, and three dates into their most successful headlining tour to date, Lynyrd Skynyrd's chartered Convair 240 developed mechanical difficulties near the end of their flight from Greenville, South Carolina to LSU in Baton Rouge, Louisiana!. Though the pilots attempted an emergency landing on a small airstrip, the plane ran out of fuel and crashed in a forest near Gillsburg, Mississippi!. Singer/songwriter Ronnie Van Zant, guitarist/vocalist Steve Gaines, backing vocalist Cassie Gaines, assistant road manager Dean Kilpatrick, pilot Walter McCreary and co-pilot William Gray were all killed on impact!. Other band members were injured, some seriously!. Drummer Artimus Pyle crawled out of the plane wreckage with several broken ribs, but was able to walk, as were road crew members Kenneth Peden Jr!. and Mark Frank!. The three injured men hiked some distance from the crash site, through swampy woods, and finally flagged down farmer Johnny Mote, who had come to investigate!. Varying accounts have Mote either firing a warning shot into the air or actually shooting Pyle in the shoulder — no report is completely reliable!. Pyle claimed in a February 2007 appearance on Howard Stern's Sirius radio program that Mote had shot him; Mote has always denied shooting the drummer!. Video of a barechested Pyle at the 1979 Volunteer Jam does not show evidence of a gunshot wound!.
Medical personnel arrived and began to ferry out the injured and the dead!. Allen Collins suffered two cracked vertebrae in his neck, and both Collins and Leon Wilkeson nearly had arms amputated as a result of crash injuries!. Wilkeson suffered severe internal injuries, including a punctured lung, and had most of his teeth knocked out!. Gary Rossington broke both his arms and both his legs in the crash, and took many months to recuperate!. Leslie Hawkins sustained a concussion, broke her neck in three places and had severe facial lacerations!. Road crew member Steve Lawler suffered severe contusions and facial lacerations!. Security manager Gene Odom was seriously burned on his arm and face and lost the sight in one eye as a result of an emergency flare on board the plane that was activated during the crash!. Victims were taken to the hospital in McComb, Mississippi by ambulances and other vehicles!. Keyboardist Billy Powell's nose was nearly torn off as he suffered severe facial lacerations, and he later caused a controversy by giving a lurid account of Cassie Gaines' final moments on a VH-1 Behind The Music special about the band, claiming that the backing singer's throat was cut from ear to ear and that she bled to death in his arms!. Powell also claimed that Ronnie Van Zant's head had been smashed!. Powell's version of events has been discounted by both Artimus Pyle and Judy Van Zant Jenness, who posted the autopsy reports on the band's website in early 1998 in order to set the record straight!.[citation needed] Despite this faux pas, Powell has been on good terms with the remaining band members since the incident!.
Despite all of this - i sure do dislike Lynyrd Skynyrd!.!.!.Www@Enter-QA@Com
Medical personnel arrived and began to ferry out the injured and the dead!. Allen Collins suffered two cracked vertebrae in his neck, and both Collins and Leon Wilkeson nearly had arms amputated as a result of crash injuries!. Wilkeson suffered severe internal injuries, including a punctured lung, and had most of his teeth knocked out!. Gary Rossington broke both his arms and both his legs in the crash, and took many months to recuperate!. Leslie Hawkins sustained a concussion, broke her neck in three places and had severe facial lacerations!. Road crew member Steve Lawler suffered severe contusions and facial lacerations!. Security manager Gene Odom was seriously burned on his arm and face and lost the sight in one eye as a result of an emergency flare on board the plane that was activated during the crash!. Victims were taken to the hospital in McComb, Mississippi by ambulances and other vehicles!. Keyboardist Billy Powell's nose was nearly torn off as he suffered severe facial lacerations, and he later caused a controversy by giving a lurid account of Cassie Gaines' final moments on a VH-1 Behind The Music special about the band, claiming that the backing singer's throat was cut from ear to ear and that she bled to death in his arms!. Powell also claimed that Ronnie Van Zant's head had been smashed!. Powell's version of events has been discounted by both Artimus Pyle and Judy Van Zant Jenness, who posted the autopsy reports on the band's website in early 1998 in order to set the record straight!.[citation needed] Despite this faux pas, Powell has been on good terms with the remaining band members since the incident!.
Despite all of this - i sure do dislike Lynyrd Skynyrd!.!.!.Www@Enter-QA@Com
I don't know much, but I do know an interesting fact about the crash: 2 weeks before they bought that plane, Aerosmith was going to buy it!. They chose not to, however; because the manager said he had a "bad feeling" about it!.Www@Enter-QA@Com
there is a lot of information about them and some history!.!.check out their site below!.!.!.even mentions how their plane!.!.which was short on fuel crashed in 1977Www@Enter-QA@Com