NTSB To Review Air Race Safety Plan

The pilot of a vintage plane that crashed and killed nine at an air race in Nevada on Friday knew his sport was dangerous, telling an interviewer earlier this year that the souped-up engines handle so much stress that they are "essentially 12-cylinder hand grenades."

Jimmy Leeward's rebuilt World War II fighter plane crashed into a spectator area with such force that investigators say reconstructing the aircraft will be hard because it broke into so many pieces. "We may not have everything to work with," said Howard Plagens, who is leading the investigation for the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB).

Crashes and even pilot fatalities are not uncommon at air races, but the deaths of eight spectators and Leeward have brought scrutiny of Federal Aviation Administration oversight.

"We will thoroughly examine FAA's current (safety) procedures, what comprehensive plan was in place for this particular race and whether it was followed or not," NTSB member Mark Rosekind told reporters Sunday.

Rosekind said the NTSB could recommend changes to improve air-race safety after its investigation, which will take months.

The crash occurred at the National Championship Air Races, an annual event in Reno that features daredevil pilots racing wing-to-wing as low as 100 feet off the ground around a course marked with pylons. Air races are a cousin of air shows that feature stunt pilots and military jets but are far more dangerous.

"These guys have always been pushing the edge of the envelope in terms of driving the airplanes hard, driving engines hard," Massachusetts Institute of Technology aeronautics professor John Hansman said. "The races are like NASCAR, where you're trying to maneuver around the other guy."

The NTSB also is investigating a fatal crash Saturday that killed a pilot at an air show in Martinsburg, W.Va. Air races and air shows are regulated by the same FAA branch but face different standards.

Before approving air races, the FAA examines the race course and spectator area to make sure that a crash or collision does not endanger spectators, the FAA said in a statement Sunday.