Surviving the Unthinkable

A Story on the Lucky Plane Crash Outside of Odessa, Mo

Did everyone have a good Labor Day? I can think of a few people that surely had an interesting day. If you aren’t a part of the Junior Firefighters or a neighbor, you might not have heard about the plane crash that happened Monday in the area where many Wellington-Napoleon students live. 

A small homemade plane carrying two residents of Grain Valley, Mo, was flying to Marshall, Mo, for breakfast when their temperature gauge started raising. Fearing an engine failure, they decided to make an emergency landing, right in the front yard of Wellington student Ashlynn Meyer Huffmaster. 

With a loud crash of metal, the two flyers landed the plane by gliding onto the gravel road. Unfortunately, they hit a mailbox which made the plane spin. The left wing hit a tree and finally came to a stop. With much luck, the two elderly men came out of the plane with only a few scratches. Wellington-Napoleon alumni Logan Neer and Mason Fischer were called to the scene with the Wellington-Napoleon ambulance, along with two fire trucks from Odessa. When asked about what the area looked like, Adrian Zaladin said there were, “Two big tow trucks, two different police officers, and a semi to haul the plane”. The plane was picked up and towed around 1:30 p.m., around 4 hours after the crash. The biggest emotion in the neighborhood was pure relief that the passengers came away from the crash with only scratches.

Story By Ashlynn Meyer Huffmaster