Plane & Pilot Blog has a commentary by Marc Lee on Harrison Ford and his recent crash at Santa Monica Airport. (The crash was diaried here and here.) Lee offers some points for consideration and put the accident in context. I suggest reading the whole thing (there's a picture of what I think are Ford's aircraft, reason enough) because it has some important lessons the general public probably didn't get from the news media coverage. Here's an excerpt:
I have no doubt that “Mr. Ford” is tired of seeing his name in print- especially in connection with this accident. Having met him on occasion, Ford seems very much a pilot first and an actor second. Sorry to ruin it for all you Star Wars fan-kids out there. He has said himself several times that he acts so he can fly, not the other way around. So, like it or not, the fact that Ford was at the controls of his aircraft (and flying solo), is why we’re talking about this accident. So what do we learn from it?
First, Ford is well-trained. He didn’t panic and stall/spin the Ryan. Even the most critical look at the wreckage shows a remarkably little amount of damage. No fire, no buildings were destroyed; not even a tree was damaged so badly it had to be removed. Sure, the nose was smashed upward, but the windshields were not even cracked. This was a “controlled crash” just like Bob Hoover himself talked about at this year’s Aviation Legends dinner. Hoover said to the audience that evening, “Always fly the airplane all the way into the crash. Be the pilot and not just a passenger.” Given Ford’s friendship with Hoover, he must have listened...
It's a thoughtful and well-written blog post - definitely check out
the rest, because it puts the kind of flying Ford does for the sheer enjoyment of it into perspective. The airport he was flying out of is under threat of closure; the kind of flying that Ford can enjoy is increasingly out of reach for most of us. And that's a terrible shame because it will be a meaner and smaller world if those things disappear.
9:13 PM PT: UPDATE Otteray Scribe found a great video discussion of Ford and his flying abilities at AOPA: http://www.aopa.org/...