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Pilot Makes Crash Landing In Hardee County Orange Grove

Photo from Hardee County Emergency Management Department

The pilot, Gary Smith, is in stable condition at Florida Hospital in Wauchula after crashing in this Hardee County orange grove.

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By NEIL JOHNSON | The Tampa Tribune

Published: December 7, 2008

A pilot flying from Leesburg to Fort Myers crashed in a Hardee County orange grove while trying to make an emergency landing this morning.

The pilot, Gary Smith - who spends the winter in Clermont -is in stable condition at Florida Hospital in Wauchula, the Hardee County Sheriff's Department said.

Smith was trapped in the plane that was upside down in a grove off Dansby Road west of Wauchula until found by utility workers responding to reports of a power outage to about 160 customers, Hardee County Sheriff's Col. Arnold Lanier said.

Workers from the Peace River Electric Cooperative called the sheriff's office at 8:49 a.m. The utility workers along with deputies lifted the front of the aircraft and Smith crawled from the wreckage.

It was not known how long Smith was trapped in the aircraft before he was found.

Smith, from Riverhaven, N.Y., said his homemade Long-EZ aircraft had engine trouble. He was trying to land in an open field but clipped power lines, flipped and came down about 80 feet from the road, Lanier said.

The Federal Aviation Administration has been notified and will investigate the crash, Lanier said.

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