Feds face suit over '02 air tanker crash
By The Associated Press
Casper, Wyo. - Family members of two men killed in a 2002 plane crash while fighting the Big Elk fire near Estes Park have sued six federal agencies, saying the agencies allowed lax airplane maintenance.
The amended lawsuit added the Agriculture, Interior and Transportation departments, the Bureau of Land Management, the Federal Aviation Administration and the U.S. Forest Service, according to U.S. District Court records. Hawkins & Powers Aviation Inc. already had been named as a defendant.
The lawsuit says federal agencies saved money by relying for decades on private contractors, and encouraged those contractors to fly older aircraft.
"All of these policies, and many others, demonstrate that the U.S. Forest Service and its employees were completely responsible for updating the maintenance schedules of the P4Y-2 as that plane underwent extensive (and improper) modifications in order to serve as a firefighting bombardier aircraft," the lawsuit said.
As of Friday, the federal government had not yet responded to the lawsuit. Hawkins & Powers has denied responsibility in previous court filings.
Pilot Rich Schwartz, of Ulm, Mont., and co-pilot Milton Stollak, of Cathedral City, Calif., died July 18, 2002, when the left wing fell off their plane, igniting fuel and sending the plane crashing to the ground.
Federal air safety inspectors determined an 18-inch crack in a wing support caused the crash.