Piper airplane crashes in Dixon field near airport

Alex T. Paschal/.Emergency vehicles leave the scene of a plane crash just outside of Dixon Monday evening.

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DIXON - About 7:15 p.m. Monday, a small private prop plane registered to Skyhawk Flying Club of Dixon crashed into a cornfield less than half a mile from the Dixon airport.

Police and fire officials said they found the pilot walking away from the wreckage. He was the only person aboard and was taken to KSB Hospital.

Officials did not release the pilot's name, but bystanders identified him as Loren Wolf of Dixon.

Loren Wolf was listed in fair condition Monday night at KSB with undisclosed injuries.

Details of the crash are being sorted out.

Lee County Sheriff John Varga said no flight plan had been filed, and there was no indication what might have caused the Piper PA-28-181 to clip nearby railroad tracks and tumble into the field on the other side of the airport.

Even the 30-yard path along which the plane bounced end-over-end puzzled officials, who noted it was well out of line with either runway at Walgreen Field.

Union Pacific Railroad employees identified a scuff mark on nearby tracks where the plane apparently clipped a rail before tumbling through tall grass and into the young corn.

The Sheriff's Department and the Federal Aviation Administration are investigating, Varga said.

FAA officials could not be reached monday night.

Damage to the four-seat plane was significant.

The Piper PA-28-181, a model popular among flight schools for its reliability and relative safety, lay upside down, the guts of its mangled engine hanging from the nose.

Scraps of white metal and shards of the shattered propelled littered the field. The landing gear and tail were shorn off, and the left wing twisted and pinned against the inverted fuselage.

No one at the Dixon airport answered a phone call seeking details.

The last reported plane crash in the Sauk Valley was in July 2006.

Reach Sam Smith at 815-284-2222 or 800-798-4085, ext. 525.

Reach Sam Smith at 815-625-3600 or 800-798-4085, ext. 525.