http://www.2theadvocate.com/news/8104547.html <br> <b>Police responding to downed Cessna find pot</b> <b>By KIMBERLY VETTER AND JARED JANES</b> <i>Advocate staff writers</i> Published: Jun 21, 2007 - Page: 1B Police investigating a plane crash Wednesday morning in the backyard of a north Baton Rouge home first found a nose-down single-engine plane and later 14 potted mar1juana plants. No one was injured in the plane crash, but a woman was arrested on a felony count of cultivation of mar1juana. Police found the plants Wednesday afternoon while they were working at the crash site at 3229 Canonicus St. Betty McManus, 53, who lives in an apartment behind the house, was accused of growing the mar1juana, police spokesman Cpl. L’Jean McKneely said. Darryl Jenkins, 51, who also lives in the apartment, was issued a misdemeanor summons on a possession of mar1juana count. The Cessna 206 crashed in the yard just after 10 a.m. after pilot Robin Tendolkar said the plane lost power, a Metro Airport official said Wednesday. Tendolkar, an aerial photographer for Gulf Coast Aerial Mapping, had finished a 35-mile flight and had received clearance from the airport to land, said Bill Profita, an airport spokesman. Soon after Tendolkar checked his landing gear, the plane lost power, Profita said. Why it lost power is under investigation by the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board. Tendolkar, who was not injured, declined comment. Although he wasn’t injured, he had to be pulled from the cockpit by a neighbor who saw the plane go down and ran to help. Donald Ray Henry said he was standing in his backyard on Canonicus Street talking to a friend when he heard the sputtering engine of a plane overhead. Henry’s friend, Clarence McGarner, a Baton Rouge police detective, glanced up and said out loud to himself: “That plane is kind of low.” Seconds later, the southbound Cessna flew right over Henry’s roof, grazed the top of a towering pine tree and crashed into a live oak tree three houses down the street. The oak spun the plane around and it came to rest at 10:19 a.m. atop a downed tree branch. “It was an almost perfect crash,” McGarner said. After he saw the plane hit the tree, McGarner jumped into his car to call police headquarters and report a plane had gone down, while Henry ran toward the plane to check on anyone inside. He found an alert pilot who was able to talk and help push out a broken window. Numerous agencies, including the Baton Rouge fire and police departments, EMS and State Police, arrived at the crash site. Howard Ward with the Baton Rouge Fire Department said firefighters put a layer of protective foam on the ground near the plane in case of fuel leakage. They also stayed around until the plane was carted off by Roadrunner Towing Co. “It’s always unfortunate to have a plane go down, especially in a crowded city,” Ward said. “In this event, however, we were very lucky.” Reginald McManus, 16, was asleep in his bedroom when the plane landed in his yard. “I thought it was lightning at first,” he said, adding he didn’t know what to think when he looked outside and saw the plane. “It shook the whole house. I’m lucky it missed me.” Jenkins said he had been sitting on a bench right where the plane hit only 10 minutes before the crash. He said his wife called him and told him what happened and he couldn’t believe it. Later that afternoon, police found the mar1juana plants 10 to 15 yards from the plane. “You never know when you’re going to have a plane crash in your backyard,” McKneely said. <b>What are the odds? Just minding your own business, cultivating your “crop”, and a plane falls from the sky and ruins everything… hahah</b>
