Aerobatic pilot amazed at outcome of midair collision | News

CAMERON PARK, CA - Veteran aerobatic pilot Julie Clark is the former owner of the plane involved in a midair collison Sunday night. She calls it "remarkable" that the two pilots survived.

The accident involving a Robinson R-22 helicopter and Beechcraft Debonaire airplane happened about 7 p.m. Sunday night in the skies to the north of Antioch and Sherman Island at the south end of the Delta.

"They did a great job, everybody involved. And the gal, who I hear she's a student pilot - magnificent job - turned the fuel off, did all the right things," said Clark, who owns American Aerobatics in Cameron Park and has flown in front of millions of spectators at airshows in the United States and Canada.

The 29-year old woman flying the helicopter has not yet been identified. The plane's pilot, Ronald Gawer of Brentwood, owns the Beechcraft formerly owned by Clark, who used it as a support plane for her aerobatic show for years.

"They showed the airplane sitting on the ramp and it was my N-number. And I thought, oh, that's the airplane I used to own. And I thought about it all day...because I did a lot of the restoration, most of it myself and owned it for seven years," Clark said at one of her airplane hangers in Cameron Park.

Clark said a midair collision at night is one of a pilot's worst nightmares.

"To have this happen at night where one hits the other and probably she wasn't even looking and not knowing he was back there and he probably didn't see her, obviously. Very scary and to have it at night, just horrific," Clark said.

She's sad to see her former support plane damaged beyond repair, especially since she spend untold hours restoring it, but she's relieved the pilots and passenger in the Beechcraft survived with nothing but very minor injuries.

The outcome of this midair collision is the best you could ask for.

"The best, it was just the best. Except for the airplanes, but it's in this case, it's just metal now," Clark said.