For many, the name Lynyrd Skynyrd instantly conjures up the day in 1977 when three band
members died in a plane crash in the woods of Mississippi. For Lynyrd Skynyrd fans, that
day was one of the most tragic in rock history. Here's the truth behind the Lynyrd Skynyrd
plane crash.
On October 20, 1977, Lynyrd Skynyrd was skyrocketing to fame and had several new members on the
start of a three-month tour to promote their new album, Street Survivors. But they weren't
exactly traveling in style. The plane chosen for their tour was an old 1948 Convair 240,
a twin-engine prop that had already racked up over 29,000 flight hours. It was shaky
enough that earlier in the year, Aerosmith had decided the plane was too dangerous to
fly in.
Still, despite the protests of guitarist Allen Collins and head of security Gene Odom, Lynyrd
Skynyrd decided to use it anyway, with band leader Ronnie Van Zant reportedly saying just
before boarding,
"If the Lord wants you to die on this plane, when it's your time, it's your time."
It would prove tragically prophetic.
The plane took off at 4:02 p.m. from Greenville South Carolina, heading for Baton Rouge, Louisiana,
with an estimated arrival time of 6:45 p.m. Pilot Walter McCreary notified the flight
tower that they had roughly five hours of fuel on board, plenty for the flight.
But just a couple hours later, while still over Mississippi, McCreary contacted the Air
Traffic Control Center in Houston, saying they were out of fuel. It was the last communication
from the plane.
Band members were playing cards while Van Zant napped on the floor when the pilots suddenly
alerted them that they were out of fuel. Drummer Artimus Pyle, a pilot himself, told everyone
how to prepare for the crash. While some reportedly panicked, most just sat in silent prayer,
hoping for a safe landing.
Ten minutes later, the plane went down in the trees near Gillsburg, Mississippi. Keyboardist
Billy Powell told the Orlando Sentinel,
"I remember we started clipping those pine trees. It felt like being rolled down a hill
in a garbage can and being hit by about a hundred baseball bats at the same time."
The plane then impacted the ground and skidded another 140 feet. The wings were torn off,
and the cockpit smashed into a tree, killing McCrery and his co-pilot, William Gray. The
fuselage broke off and the top of the plane tore open, throwing people out. Powell told
Rolling Stone,
"I crashed into a table; people were hit by flying objects all over the plane."
The remains of the plane finally slid to a stop in a swampy, wooded area.
Powell crawled out of the wreckage and saw that the fuselage, cockpit, wings and tail
section were gone. His nose, he discovered, was now hanging from the side of his face
and bleeding profusely. The musician sat on top of the airplane in shock, crying, before
he heard bassist Leon Wilkeson calling for help.
"I remember hearing Leon screaming, 'Get me out of here.'"
Pyle also survived the crash, his ribs, quote, "sticking out" of his chest. Along with roadie
Ken Peden, the three left the crash site seeking help. They found it in the form of local farmer
Johnny Mote, who originally through the ragged men were escaped convicts before realizing
the awful truth. He told Rolling Stone,
"One of them was hugging me around the neck and telling me, 'We got to get them out.'"
But there was no help for pilots McCreary and Gray, band members Ronnie Van Zant, Steve
Gaines, and Cassie Gaines, or assistant road manager Dean Kilpatrick. All six were killed
on impact. And the 20 survivors were in bad shape, with Rolling Stone reporting that,
"[They] endured shattered bones, torn flesh, lengthy hospitalizations and grueling rehabilitations."
Fans around were stunned as images of the crash began playing on new reports across
the world.
"You can't even realize, seeing one of these things on television, exactly what a crash
of this magnitude looks like."
Speculation on the cause of the crash immediately centered on the lack of fuel.
"Authorities still believe the plane ran out of gas. But why? Didn't they put enough gas
in the tanks? Or was there a leak?"
After a lengthy investigation, the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board released its official
investigation. Nine separate findings were listed, including statements that both engines
on the plane, quote, "ceased to produce power because the aircraft's useable fuel was exhausted"
and that the crew, Walter McCreary and William Gray, quote, "failed to monitor adequately
the fuel flow, en route fuel consumption, and fuel quantity [gauges]." and also didn't
"take appropriate pre-flight action to assure an adequate fuel supply."
But their mistakes were apparently compounded by a mechanical failure that caused one of
the engines to burn through fuel much faster than normal.
That would explain why, on another flight two days earlier, Allen Collins witnessed
a 10-foot flame shooting out of the right engine. Ironically, Pyle told the Orlando
Sentinel that during the tragic last flight, the band had decided that going forward they
would only fly on new planes.
"We had decided to get a Learjet for the band, a beautiful bus for the crew. It was ridiculous
for us to be on an old plane like that."
With the plane crash behind them, it would take time for everyone involved with Lynyrd
Skynyrd to recover. Five surviving band members Allen Collins, Billy Powell, Gary Rossington,
Leon Wilkerson, and Artimus Pyle suffered critical injuries, from multiple broken bones
to debilitating internal injuries. It looked like the end of the band forever.
"Will there be a Lynyrd Skynyrd after this?"
"I don't think so."
The first step in the recovery process was changing the album cover, which originally
showed crash victim Steve Gaines surrounded by fire. But it was a long process, and it
wasn't until a decade later in 1987 that the surviving members of the band reunited.
"The first thing I'd like to do is bring out the survivors of our plane crash ten years
ago."
The band reformed, joined by a former guitarist for the group, Ed King, with Ronnie Van Zant's
brother Johnny Van Zant taking over as lead singer.
But there would still be more tragedies: Collins, who was left paraplegic after a motorcycle
accident in 1986, succumbed to pneumonia in 1990. Wilkeson was found dead in his hotel
room in 2001. And in 2009, Powell died of a heart attack. That left Rossington and Pyle
as the only surviving members of the original band.
In October 2019, Ronnie Van Zant's widow, Judy Van Zant-Jenness, joined others to dedicate
a new monument at the crash site, created with money from the Lynyrd Skynyrd Monument
Project, which raised over $80,000. Van Zant-Jeness said,
"It's been 42 years today since we lost Ronnie, Steve, Cassie and Dean. But they will live
on through the music of Lynyrd Skynyrd and all of the fans from around the world."
And 2020 promises to be a big year for the band. A film about the tragic plane crash,
called Street Survivors: The True Story of the Lynyrd Skynyrd Plane Crash, is scheduled
to be released in June, the same month Lynyrd Skynyrd is planning to play their final concert
ever, at the end of their "Last of the Street Survivors Farewell Tour."
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