Fatal plane crash witnessed by Bella Vista man

"I was standing right beside him 10 minutes before the crash." Brandon Nolker aircraft mechanic

BENTONVILLE — Bella Vista resident Brandon Nolker spoke with Rex Grimsley a few minutes before Grimsley’s plane crashed Wednesday morning at Bentonville Municipal Airport.

“I was standing right beside him 10 minutes before the crash,” said Nolker, an aircraft maintenance technician. “He came into the hangar to talk about getting some maintenance done on his aircraft. There was nothing wrong with it, it just needed some scheduled maintenance.”

Grimsley, 70, was an experienced pilot. He was flying his 1983 Beechcraft Bonanza to another airport for its annual inspection.

Minutes after Grimsley left, Nolker said, he and his co-workers heard the sound of an engine quickly accelerating nearby.

“A guy I work with yelled, ‘Look out!’ and then we heard the crash and saw the smoke,” Nolker said. “We went outside and could see he hit the hangar just above the door and the hole in the side where the engine went through.”

The crash scarred the front of the hangar with several gashes in a metal door. Two large holes visible above the door and the front of the building showed damage from smoke and fire. The ensuing fire blackened the tarmac in an area several yards around the remnants of the airplane frame.

The engine separated from the plane and went through the hangar, punching a hole in the south wall before coming to rest against the north wall of the adjacent hangar. The crashed and burned plane rested in front of the damaged hangar.

The crash was reported at 9:30 a.m. The FAA is investigating the crash.

Investigators say it appears Grimsley, who was taking off going south, veered to the left to avoid an airplane that was landing going north. The row of hangers on the east side of the runway are approximatley 400 feet from the runway’s centerline. The plane hit the hanger approximately half way down the runway.

John Brannen, senior air safety investigator for the National Transportation Safety Board said Grimsley was taking off to the south as another plane was landing to the north. Grimsley swung left then crashed into the hangar, and the plane caught fire, Brannen said. Grimsley died in the crash.

Planes typically land into the wind. The direction to land is at the pilot’s discretion if there is little to no wind, as there was Wednesday morning, Brannen said.

“That’s definitely a possibility, yes,” Brannen said when asked whether the planes would have collided had Grimsley’s plane not changed course.

Bentonville Municipal Airport is an uncontrolled airport, meaning it doesn’t have an operating control tower.

“It’s really see-and-avoid and hear-and-avoid for other traffic when you’re in an uncontrolled environment,” Brannen said.

While uncontrolled airports don’t have typical air traffic control, they have what’s called a common traffic advisory frequency that pilots use to announce their intention to take off or land and to announce their positions, he said.

The airport saw more than 27,000 landings and departures in 2014, according to the recently updated airport plan. It has 13 hangars housing approximately 70 aircraft.