File Photo
A small plane had to emergency land via parachute in the middle of Martin Luther King Blvd. Tuesday morning in Fayetteville. No one suffered any major injuries.
Parachuting Planes
Alright, if for some reason you haven’t heard about the airplane that had to emergency crash land in the middle of MLK Blvd. Tuesday morning, here you go. Thankfully, no one was seriously hurt or killed. It did hit a truck, though.
So as life was casual and banal on the Tuesday mornings we’ve all grown to accept in Fayetteville, up in the sky, three people — one of them a former Wal-Mart executive — were in full peril mode.
The plane was on its way from Bentonville to Waco, Texas, when it began losing oil pressure, said Sgt. Craig Stout, a spokesman for the Fayetteville Police Department. The pilot, Bill Simon the U.S. Wal-Mart CEO from 2010-2014, was on his way to attempt a landing at Drake Field in Fayetteville until the plane lost all oil pressure, Stout said.
That was when Simon took emergency measures and deployed the small plane’s parachute. From the looks of the plane’s descent on the videos posted on social media, the parachute was able to keep the plane at a reasonable, non-lethal speed. It certainly crashed, but not as violently as one may think when one hear’s “plane crash.”
Only one person sustained an injury and needed to be taken to the hospital, but nothing life-threatening happened, thankfully.
What did this mean for the rest of Fayetteville? MLK was shut down for the duration of the day until that evening, causing many people their own peril of traffic.
The event ended up being a big deal on the local news outlets (of course, it’s even here after all) and it even trended on Facebook. Geez.
We at the Free Weekly are just glad no one was seriously hurt.
Fayetteville Civil Rights Commission Members Appointed
The Fayetteville City Council voted Tuesday night to appoint seven new members to the new Civil Rights Commission. Alderman La Tour was the only one the vote against it, with the total vote being 6 to 1.
The commission was formed after Ordinance 5781 was approved by voters. The newly elected group will act as a moderator to hear claims of discrimination, such as being fired or evicted because of a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity.
The commission intentionally consists of two business community representatives, two owners or managers of rental property, one person with human resources or employment law experience and two citizens, at least one of whom, is from the LGBT community.
The commission consists of citizens from different walks of life:
- Candy Clark (representative of the business community – term ending TBD)
- D’Andre Jones (representative of the business community – term ending TBD)
- Teresa Turk (owner or manager of rental property – term ending TBD)
- Rebekah Champagne (owner or manager of rental property – term ending TBD)
- Henderson Joseph Brown, IV (representative with experience in Human Resources or employment law – term ending 12/31/17)
- Benjamin Garner Harrison, IV (citizen at large – term ending 12/31/18)
- Carol (Chris) Christoffel (citizen at large whom identifies as gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender – term ending 12/31/16)
The terms for the “TBD” commission members will be decided by drawing straws at the first commission meeting, according to the city’s Nominating Committee.
A total of seventeen people applied for the board, and they were interviewed by a nominating committee who narrowed the applicants down to seven.
