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November 07, 2009

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Probe Continues In Fatal Accident In Which Car Sped Off Airport Runway

Published: 10:45 AM, 01/12/2009 Last updated: 10:46 AM, 01/12/2009
 


Source: The Greeneville Sun

Hospital Releases

Injured Second

Woman In Vehicle

By BILL JONES

Staff Writer

Greeneville police are continuing an investigation of a fatal accident Friday night in which a car sped off the end of the runway at the Greeneville-Greene County Municipal Airport and hurdled more than 150 feet before crashing to the ground, according to Greeneville police.

Robert Pershing, a Greene County-Greeneville Emergency Medical Services shift supervisor, on Saturday, identified the woman who died as a result of the accident as Cindy Lemaster, 27, of McInturff Road, Limestone.

He said Lemaster was pronounced dead after being taken by ambulance to Laughlin Memorial Hospital on Friday night.

A second accident victim, whom Pershing identified as Tonya Isley, 30, of Old Baileyton Road, was flown from the scene to the Johnson City Medical Center by a Wings Air Rescue helicopter on Friday night.

She was discharged from the JCMC on Sunday, according to a nursing supervisor there.

Both women had been ejected from a compact 1995 Chevrolet Corsica after it sped off the end of the airport runway and flipped over several times before coming to rest near the intersection of Whitehouse Road and Airport Road, according to Pershing.

He said the car was registered to Lemaster's mother, but police declined to say this morning if they had determined which of the two women had been driving the car.

A press release issued by the Greeneville Police Department early Saturday said the department had received at 9:12 p.m. on Friday a complaint of an accident involving injury on Whitehouse Road near the Airport Road intersection.

"On officer's arrival, a red Chevrolet Corsica was found lying on its top near Whitehouse Road," the release said. "A debris trail was leading up the embankment toward the airport runway.

"Officers determined that the vehicle had traveled down the airport runway," the release said.

The car bore a Washington County license plate.

An off-duty Greene County-Greeneville Emergency Medical Services employee had discovered and reported the accident and that police initially thought the car had simply run off Whitehouse Road near its intersection with Airport Road.

But while examining the scene, police said, they found mud, grass and other debris stuck to the inside of the chain-link fence off the end of the airport runway that ends above Whitehouse Road.

Officers said, they later found automobile tracks in the grass at the end of the run way and evidence that a vehicle had struck a grass covered earthen mound at the end of the runway.

Debris from the earthen mound had been thrown down-hill into the fence, officers said.

After leaving the end of the runway, according to the police release, the vehicle traveled a short distance in grass, then went airborne over the chain-link fence airport at the end of the airport property and tumbled down an embankment before coming to a stop on its roof after crossing a small creek near Whitehouse Road.

Police said the car apparently had entered the airport property through a gate at the rear of the Greeneville Aviation building.

But officers were at a loss this morning to understand why the car had driven off the end of the airport runway at an apparent high rate of speed.

Officers said the Tennessee Highway Patrol was being asked to try to help determine how fast the car was traveling when it left the end of the airport runway.

Earlier Accident

Police also said a red 1995 Chevrolet Corsica automobile with a similar license plate number had been involved in a hit-and-run traffic accident near the East Andrew Johnson Highway exit from the Greeneville Commons shopping center shortly after 9 p.m. Friday.

A police report said a red Chevrolet Corsica had struck the rear of a 1996 Oldsmobile Cutlass that was waiting to pull from the shopping center's exit road onto the East Andrew Johnson Highway.

After the collision, according to the police report, the Chevrolet had fled the scene.

For more information and stories, see today's edition of The Greeneville Sun.

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