Pilots safely wound up their qualifying runs for the National Championship Air Races on Wednesday, one day after a veteran competitor from Utah died in a crash and another pilot was hospitalized in a separate mishap.
Utah pilot Rick Brickert, 38, Sandy, was killed Tuesday in a fiery wreck of his unlimited class "Pond Racer." Race competition began Thursday and ends Sunday.Earlier, a home-built biplane piloted by Robert Hugo, 58, Rochester, Wash., was demolished in a spectacular crash that hospitalized Hugo.
Brickert's plane, which flies in a class that exceeds 500 mph around the course at the Stead Airport north of Reno, went down in a dry lake bed about 11/2 miles southeast of the air field. Witnesses said it exploded on impact.
"He tried to make it. Tried to belly-in and it just went up in flames," witness Dale Hillyard said. "I came up and tried to help, but it was on fire."
Brickert, a United Airlines pilot, barked a mayday to the tower seconds before the plane went down.
He escaped an emergency two years ago when the left engine of the craft failed and caught fire.