3 Members of the Case Western Reserve Wrestling Team

[Old_Marine_Wrestler 245]

Were killed in a plane crash today near the Cuyahoga County Airport.

 

Lucas Marcelli of Massilon, OH (soph)

John Hill of St Simons, GA (frosh)

Abraham Pishevar of Rockville, MD (frosh)

 

William Felton from Saginaw MI was piloting the plane.

[tommygun 52]

Wow.  This is horrible.  All the best to family and friends of those lost today. 

[Sheerstress 168]

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/08/26/four-dead-plane-crash/14614783/

[Coach_J 2,177]

Lucas Marcelli was my high school coach's son.  This is a horrible loss.   He was an outstanding young man--a 2x Ohio state placewinner studying pre-med with a 3.7 GPA at a very prestigious university.  He was the total reflection of a great family and, in his father, superior guidance in wrestling and life.  Those of us whose lives were made better by his father, Corky Marcelli, are taking this loss hard because Lucas was such a great ambassador of the sport and his family.

[silver-medal 670]

In addition, the head coach at Case, Mark Hawald, is dealing with his second tragedy as a head coach.  While at Mt Union, his team was in a bus crash that killed a member of his staff.  Mark is a terrific person and Marcelli was the wrestler leading his turnaround of the Case program.  This is a terrible loss of a great young men with huge potential outside of wrestling.  

 

Thoughts and prayers....

[legendofandy 41]

In addition, the head coach at Case, Mark Hawald, is dealing with his second tragedy as a head coach.  While at Mt Union, his team was in a bus crash that killed a member of his staff.  Mark is a terrific person and Marcelli was the wrestler leading his turnaround of the Case program.  This is a terrible loss of a great young men with huge potential outside of wrestling.  

 

Thoughts and prayers....

It was the head trainer at Mount Union who was killed in the bus crash in 2011. Info here:http://www.d3wrestle.com/?p=3610

 

Here is the open letter Hawald wrote at the time. Hard to believe he would be in a position to write another. http://www.nwcaonline.com/nwcawebsite/news/11-01-14/Open_Letter_from_Coach_Mark_Hawald_of_Mount_Union.aspx

 

Marcelli was Case's top wrestler last year, winning 30 matches as a freshman. Coach Hawald will help the team through this, but it's a tragedy you would never expect.

[ideamark 22]

Two stories I've written about the tragedy...

 

> http://www.examiner.com/article/plane-crash-kills-four-case-western-students-three-from-wrestling-team

About the accident...

 

> http://www.examiner.com/article/lives-of-promise-lost-plane-crash-that-killed-four-case-western-students

Additional info on each of the four students, including wrestling backgrounds of the Spartan wrestlers)

 

My thoughts and prayers go out to the victims' families, friends, classmates, teammates.

 

Mark

Edited August 28, 2014 by ideamark

[Coach_J 2,177]

As always, thanks for all you do for wrestling, Mark.

[Flying-Tiger 617]

Here is a link to the NTBS preliminary report. They will eventually issue a probable cause, but that usually takes a year or more when there are fatalities involved.

 

http://www.ntsb.gov/aviationquery/brief.aspx?ev_id=20140825X32653&key=1

 

 

Personal opinion; plane was overloaded and potentially out of balance which decreased engine/flight performance. When he turned left to return to the airport, this condition led to a stall and loss of control. Unfortunately, this is one of the more common causes of accidents in general aviation.

 

R.I.P. young men. Way too soon for your time. 

[ideamark 22]

Thank you for sharing the link to the initial NTSB report, Flying-Tiger. I have never read one of these before. It provides some initial insights into what may have happened.

 

Very much a heartbreaking tragedy.

Mark

[Coach_J 2,177]

Kind of bitter about this now that I have more facts.  You have to wait until you're 21 to have a beer legally.  At 9, you can shoot an uzi.  At 18 you can vote and die in war.  At 20, you can pilot a plane solo with less than a year of experience.  Plane has too many people, too much weight, imbalanced load...did not need to happen.

[Flying-Tiger 617]

NTSB's Probable Cause is out. Over gross weight at night, very easy for a rookie pilot to go wrong. Very sad.

 

http://www.ntsb.gov/_layouts/ntsb.aviation/brief.aspx?ev_id=20140825X32653&key=1

Edited December 10, 2015 by Flying-Tiger

[TBar1977 4,490]

Condolences to the families.