Montroseplane crash kills two

Published: Thursday, July 6, 2006 10:21 AM CDT
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Local architect, Rifle flight

instructor die

By Matthew Beaudin

Two men died in a plane crash on Monday morning in Montrose when the plane they were piloting crashed into the cab of a parked semi truck in a Montrose neighborhood.

Telluride and Aspen architect David Gibson and his flight instructor, Larry Smalley, of Rifle, were both killed.

The crashing plane, which landed just feet from houses on Ninth Street near downtown Montrose, injured no one else. The area is under the Montrose Regional Airport's flight path.

Smalley, 65, was working with Gibson, 61, as Gibson learned to pilot a plane he had just purchased.

Friends said Gibson had recently taken a hiatus from flying to best cancer. His new plane, a single-engine Beechcraft Bonanza, can carry as many as six passengers.

Levi Hawks, 69, and his wife, Susan, 45, were at home with their sons on Monday morning and were planning on cleaning out the truck from a long haul. Levi Hawks said his wife was just about to set foot outside when the telephone rang, holding her up. Then he heard the plane come ripping into his truck.

“And it just jarred it like an earthquake,” he said of his house. “There was just a big bang and another explosion.”

Hawks said he went outside and by that time the truck and plane were largely destroyed.

“The truck was just completely engulfed in flames and gas was running down the front of the truck and it was just getting worse,” he said. “It was just like a furnace blast right in your face.”

The initial 911 came into authorities just before 10 a.m. and Dale Erickson, Deputy Fire Chief at the Montrose Fire Protection District, said that fire crews were on the scene some two minutes later.

Erickson said 25 minutes later the fires were out, and that had the truck not been parked where it was that accident could have been even worse. “Most of us feel that if the plane wouldn't have hit that semi there's a good chance that it would have continued on and hit a residence,” he said.

“Sad day,” Erickson said. “Sad day.”

Gibson will be remembered for his architectural diamonds that frost the region, from Aspen to Telluride and beyond.

“I've known him for 25 years,” said longtime colleague, architect Charles Cunniffe.

“He was a very quiet, compassionate guy,” he said.

Cuniffe lauded Gibson's talent and compassion and admired Gibson's artistic and creative style. “He had the capability to be innovative,” Cunniffe said. “He had a quiet intensity. We'll all miss him,” he said. “He was a great contributor to our field.”

Cuniffe, who also splits time between Aspen and Telluride, pilots a plane between the towns as well. “It's a half an hour instead of four hours,” he said.

Another friend and Aspen architect, Harry Teague, attended graduate school with Gibson at the Yale School of Architecture. Gibson was, at 23, a shining star. “We had just an extraordinary class of which he was one of the definite stars and just wowed us all right from the start,” Teague said. “We would always anticipate Dave's presentations.”

The pair would spend summers in Colorado designing and then building their own projects, where they would camp out at the building sites. “We all got so excited about actually building things with our hands that quite a few of us went on to do after school,” Teague said.

“The advantage to the owners is that we were very cheap. Whether or not we knew what we were doing or not was another story.”

Teague spoke of Gibson's style with reverence. “Always there would be a way that you would expect it to be done,” he said of various projects. “And in all of Dave's buildings there was always one or two places that something was done in a new, wonderfully original way.”

Gibson's designs, Teague said, were an extension of both himself and his clients. He leaves an indelible mark on the architectural community and his friends as well.

“He was always a wonderful friend,” he said. “He was always wonderful and generous in every way. He was a great guy.”

The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating the crash. Propeller failure is suspected in the accident.