It is always sad to see a loss of a "warbird" luckily nobody was badly hurt.
"Liberty Belle" crashed and burned in a field southeast of Aurora Municipal Airport Illinois this morning, but the seven people on board escaped without injury, according to aviation officials.
The plane, a B-17 "Flying Fortress," took off from the airport at 9:30 a.m. and went down about three or four miles from Aurora about 20 minutes later, according to Elizabeth Isham Cory, a spokeswoman for the Federal Aviation Administration. "The plane is burning. We believe the seven people on board escaped without injury."
The plane that crashed was manufactured in 1944 and is registered to the Liberty Foundation in Miami, Fla., which restored the "Liberty Belle." The plane was at the Aurora Municipal Airport on Saturday and Sunday, according to the foundation's website.
The "Liberty Belle" was sold on June 25, 1947 as scrap to Esperado Mining Co. of Altus, Okla. and was sold again later that year to Pratt & Whitney for $2,700, according to the foundation's website.
Whitney operated the B-17 from Nov. 19, 1947 to 1967 to test turboprop engines. It was donated in the late 1960s to the Connecticut Aeronautical Historic Association in East Hartford, but was heavily damaged in 1979 when a tornado threw another aircraft against the B-17’s mid-section, breaking the fuselage, the foundation said.
It was stored in the New England Air Museum in Connecticut until the foundation began restoring it.
The plane travels around the country, giving rides to the public. It most recently was in Indianapolis, Dayton and Cincinnati.
Gravity always wins!
After having looked at the report more closely on, I have a problem with the word "crash" used in the quoted story.
Definiton of "crash" from The free dictionary:
1. To break violently or noisily; smash.2. To undergo sudden damage or destruction on impact: The airplane crashed into the field.
Definition of an emergency landing from Wikipedia:
An emergency landing is a landing made by an aircraft in response to a crisis which either interferes with the operation of the aircraft or involves sudden mechanical emergencies necessitating diversion to the nearest airport.
Choose your own definition and use it in the story.