St. Louis Post dispatch
Wednesday, October 18, 2000
http://www.postnet.com/
Mel Carnahan, Missouri's 51st governor and the Democratic candidate in a nationally
watched race for the U.S. Senate,
died when his campaign plane plunged into rugged woods in Jefferson County during a storm
Monday night.
Killed with him were Roger A. "Randy" Carnahan, the governor's son and
regular pilot, and Chris Sifford, a top political
advisor. The pilot, presumably Randy Carnahan, reported having trouble with the
airplane's instrument system shortly
before it disappeared from aviation radar at Lambert Field.
Mel Carnahan, 66, was completing his second term as Missouri governor. He was engaged in a
tense, expensive and close
contest against U.S. Sen. John Ashcroft, R-Mo., in the Nov. 7 general election, and was
headed to a rally in the
Bootheel when he died.
Ashcroft suspended his campaign events and pulled TV and radio ads. Because of the late
date, Carnahan's name will
remain on the ballot. Funeral arrangements were pending.
In Jefferson City, the title of acting governor went to Lt. Gov. Roger Wilson, who met
this morning with top state
officials in the governor's office on the second floor of the State Capitol. One block
to the east, mourners placed
bouquets along the wrought-iron fence of the governor's mansion.
"I'd give anything that (this) did not have to occur," said Wilson. He said
he wanted to "lean on about five million
Missourians' shoulders."
Condolences to Jean Carnahan, the governor's widow, poured in from across the country
and from as far away as Egypt,
where President Clinton is meeting with leaders of the Middle East. Jean Carnahan issued a
statement urging that Vice
President Al Gore and Texas Gov. George W. Bush proceed with their final presidential
debate tonight at Washington
University.
"Because my husband cherished our democracy and its expression, he would very much
want the debate ... to go on," the
statement says. There had been talk of delaying the debate because of the accident.
The presidential campaigns adjusted plans for rallies in an atmosphere tempered by the
governor's death. Gore canceled a
pre-debate rally at the Radisson Hotel, and the Greater St. Louis Labor Council also
canceled a post-debate rally with
Gore.
The Bush campaign's debate-watch party at Clayton High School will be held, but will
be more subdued, said Catherine
Hanaway, Bush's Missouri campaign coordinator.
Gore also canceled an appearance scheduled for Wednesday in Kansas City, and will instead
travel to Jefferson City to
meet with the Carnahan's family.
A candlelight vigil was scheduled for tonight at the World Fair Pavilion in Forest Park.
Crash killed Carnahan's son, aide
Randy Carnahan, 44, of Rolla, was the oldest of the Carnahan's four children, a lawyer
and a commercial-rated pilot.
Chris Sifford, 37, was a campaign adviser who earlier had been the governor's press
secretary.
Their twin-engine private plane took off at about 7 p.m. Monday from St. Louis Parks
Downtown Airport in Cahokia for a
150-mile flight south to New Madrid, Mo.
But the Federal Aviation Administration tower at Lambert Airport lost radar contact with
the airplane at 7:32 p.m., and
residents of an area seven miles northeast of Hillsboro reported hearing an airplane in a
steep dive and then an
explosion, and seeing a fireball in nearby woods.
A spokeswoman for the FAA said today that Carnahan's plane was flying at 6,500 feet
when the pilot reported a "gyro
problem." A gyroscope on an airplane is a dashboard instrument that helps the pilot
with basic orientation and sense of
horizon - distinguishing level flight from banking, turning from straight and climbing
from descent.
The plane disappeared from radar a short time later, spokeswoman Elizabeth Isham Cory
said.
Carnahan, 66, was flying in a Cessna 335, a craft with two piston-powered engines and a
cabin that normally seats six.
Prior to takeoff, the pilot had filed an instrument flight plan, a common practice for a
multi-engine craft in good
weather or bad. Doing so puts the aircraft into the nation's air-traffic control
system and assigns an identification
number to the craft's radar screen "blip."
The six-seater plane was 20 years old and owned by the Carnahan family law firm in Rolla.
Workers with the National Transportation Safety Board went up in a Missouri State Highway
Patrol helicopter to retrace
the plane's path, while other NTSB investigators broke into teams to track witness
accounts, and weather and radar data.
``We're putting into place our game plan at this time,'' said Carol Carmody,
NTSB spokeswoman. ``We're not on any
timeframe.''
At the time of the crash, the St. Louis area was socked in by steady rain and low-level
clouds that probably rose to at
least twice the aircraft's reported altitude, said Joe Petigo, a meteorologist with
the National Weather Service in
Weldon Spring. "The chances are that he was in the clouds," Petigo said.
Jefferson County Sheriff Glenn Boyer said searchers working in darkness found a scorched
site of impact east of Old
Lemay Ferry Road about two miles north of the old Sandy Creek Covered Bridge, in the
Goldman area, and six miles west of
Pevely. He said the crash site is hilly, rocky and thick with timber and brush.
It is about 25 miles south of St. Louis.
Search turns up airplane parts
On Monday night, firefighters also found small parts of an airplane, including a landing
wheel and parts of engines, as
well as human remains. They stopped at midnight Monday because of slippery, dangerous
conditions in the dark.
Firefighters, state troopers, sheriff's deputies and FBI agents went back into the
woods shortly before dawn today.
The National Transportation Safety Board took over the site and search at 8 a.m. Carol
Carmody, a member of the
Washington-based board, was on the scene but declined to discuss the accident.
Capt. Ed Kemp, of the Jefferson County Sheriff's Department, said debris from the
crash would be taken to the National
Guard Armory in Festus for examination. Late this morning, Kemp said there had been no
positive identification of bodies
or verification in the field that the wreckage was Carnahan's plane.
Reporters and residents gathered at the Goldman Fire Protection District fire house on Old
Lemay Ferry to await
developments. Among them was Jerry Sifford of Barnhart, a cousin of Chris Sifford.
Jerry Sifford said family members had hoped that Chris Sifford had not gotten onto the
plane, but assumed the worst when
they learned that his billfold was among the personal items found at the crash site.
"We called him the governor's right-hand man," Jerry Sifford said of his
cousin.
Boyer, the sheriff, said he recently taped an ad for Carnahan's campaign. "I know
Gov. Carnahan," Boyer said. "He was a
fine man."
Funeral arrangements are pending
Funeral arrangements for Gov. Mel Carnahan and his son, Roger "Randy" Carnahan,
were incomplete Tuesday evening.
Services for Chris Sifford, the governor's political advisor, were set for the
weekend.
The Carnahan family asked that in lieu of flowers, people make contributions to the
Children's Trust Fund, P.O. Box
1641, Jefferson City, Mo. 65102-1641. The trust fund is a not-for-profit charitable
organization that addresses the
needs of abused and underprivileged children in Missouri.
Visitation for Sifford will be at 2 p.m. Saturday at the Morgan Sifford Funeral Home in
Puxico. The funeral is scheduled
for 2 p.m. Sunday at the Puxico High School gymnasium. Burial will be at the Puxico
Cemetery.
Memorials for Sifford may be made to the Chris Sifford Scholarship Fund, which was being
established at the First
Midwest Bank of Puxico. Jeff Copeland, a close friend of Sifford's, will oversee the
fund.
To contact reporter Tim O'Neil:
E-mail: toneil(a)postnet.com
Phone: 314-340-8132
Phil Carnahan
Ukiah, CA
http://www.pacificsites.net/~pcarna