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In early March 1963, Hawkshaw, Patsy and Cowboy, along with several other country music stars flew to Kansas City, Kansas to perform at three benefit concerts at the Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Hall. With the concerts ending at 8:00 P.M., all of the stars stayed in town opting to return home the next day. The next day the airport was fogged in ... no one returned home. The following day too had questionable weather; however, the artists were getting impatient. Some of the artists rented a car and headed home while others waited to determine if the plane would be available. The pilot of the Piper PA-24 Comanche was Randy Hughes.
The Hawkshaw, Patsy, Cowboy Airplane-Crash Story
Who is Randy Hughes? Randy originally was a respected recording session guitarist but felt it wasn’t rewarding enough just being a guitarist for country bands. From there, he decided to become a manager for country music artists. Associated with that, he then determined driving from gig to gig was too slow therefore he elected to buy an airplane and get his pilot’s license. Side note: Cowboy Copas’ daughter Kathy was married to Randy Hughes. Kathy was a dear friend of Miss June, in fact, June gave Kathy all of her possessions when she left the music business abruptly and unexpectedly and disappeared.
Back on point, even though the weather was shaky Randy decided it was a go ... on March 5, 1963, only Patsy, Cowboy, and Hawkshaw boarded the Piper PA-24. At 2:00 P.M. They departed Kansas City with the destination of Nashville International Airport [BNA] with a stop-over refuel in Arkansas and another in Dyersville, Tennessee. Though the weather was marginal at best, the flight was okayed by the FAA as a VFR flight [visual flight rules] only. Note: This means the pilot is not qualified to fly using the instruments, he was qualified to fly by sight only. After spending 15 minutes refueling in Arkansas, the trip continued to Dyersville landing there at 5:05 P.M. Randy requested a weather update while at Dyersville ... an employee at the FAA told him the local conditions were marginal for VFR flight and in Nashville below VFR. Randy next asked if the runways were lit at Dyersville in case he had to return there. “Yes,” the FA employee said. Randy intended to fly east to the Tennessee River and then follow it to Nashville since he was familiar with the terrain in that area. After refueling, Randy got another weather update from the cockpit ... they took off at 6:07 P.M. At the time, it was cloudy with gusty winds and only a 500-foot ceiling. At 6:29 pm, the Piper Comanche crashed into a wooded, swampy area near Camden, TN ... about 100 miles west of BNA...
Stars Who Died In Tragic Accidents [TA] Continued
Piper P-24 [click to enlarge photo]
Similar to but not the actual airplane that crashed
