Appears that a VFR rated pilot took off with a 300 foot ceiling, overcast, 2 mile visibility and perhaps tried to return to the airport. Sad situation.
Another tragic accident that didn’t need to happen if common sense had been used.
That is very sad. VFR pilot in IMC. Not good… 
Wouldn’t the Piper have to break up in flight to have a wing end up over 300 feet from the fuselage? Witnesses say the plane was flying low in circles so the impact wasn’t hard enough to send a wing that far away…I wouldn’t think.
State Police Sgt. Stephen Jones said the plane crashed at a steep angle and most of the plane and the shattered debris were in a confined area of the woods. However, a wing of the plane was found more than a football field away, he said.
Another article with photographs.
Art Reale, a friend of Lasowski who is also a pilot based at the Woodbine airport said Lasowski was not an instrument rated pilot a requirement to fly in bad weather. “Nobody should have been up flying today”, he said “He went up, probably realized he made a mistake and tried to circle in the crosswinds to come back to the runway and got disoriented,” said Raele, when asked what he thought was the cause of the accident.
That’s the impression I got when I read the story. Sounds like the dude got the leans and broke his plane.
Sounds plausible.
I know what the “leans” are but what do you mean by broke the plane…overstressed wings?
First people are guessing that it was 300ft, if you point the nose down at 3 or even 500 ft with cruise power it wouldn’t take long to go fast. and 300 feet is only 100 yards, thats a soft sand wedge. if you look 300 feet is not that far for something going 100+ MPH.
I bet if you were at 120kts and pulled that AC into a 90 degree turn you’d stall before you tore a the elevator or off, (it’d come off before a wing)
Exactly.
“Witnesses said it appeared that the plane was doing some kind of aerobatics due to the circles it was making.”
That’s a common observation from witnesses just before a disoriented pilot crashes.
This is my thinking as well. Witnesses said he was circling before he went down behind the trees. I guess that could have been a spiral they saw. 