Turkey

Pilot Crashes Crop Duster in Gender Reveal Gone Wrong

Pilot uninjured after crashing crop duster; passenger suffers minor injury

It's a tale of another gender reveal going wrong -- very wrong.

Raj Horan was flying his 2013 AT-602 Air Tractor, a single-seat crop duster, near Turkey on Sept. 7 for a gender reveal, according to a report filed with the NTSB.

Horan was to fly low over the designated spot and dump 625 gallons of pink water into the air -- revealing to those gathered below the impending arrival of a little girl.

As Horan approached, he slowed and trimmed the aircraft. He told the NTSB when he started dumping the water, the airplane began to stall and that he could not get it back.

The stall caused the plane to lose altitude, hit the ground and roll over. It eventually came to rest inverted on the ground. According to the NTSB report, the plane sustained substantial damage to the fuselage, right wing, and empennage.

Horan was not injured in the crash but a passenger in the single-seat aircraft did suffer minor injuries. In a follow-up conversation in late October, the NTSB inspector reported that he thought he pilot moved to the right and the passenger was sitting on the edge of the seat on the left side.

Horan told the NTSB there were no pre-accident mechanical failures or malfunctions with the airplane that would have precluded normal operation.

There were no injuries or damage to anyone on the ground, according to the NTSB report.

Turkey is located about 75 miles northeast of Lubbock. Horan's plane is registered to an airfield in Plainview about 45 miles southwest of Turkey.

Last month, an Iowa woman was killed by a flying piece of debris from an explosion during a gender reveal gone wrong. An earlier gender reveal mishap last year was blamed for starting a fire that burned nearly 47,000 acres and left $8 million in damage, NBC News also reported.

NBC 5's Don Peritz contributed to this report.

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