Aspen, CO – Local friends of a Snowmass resident Richard Shenk gathered to pray for the noted photographer, who was hospitalized after a fiery plane crash outside of an airport in Kentucky.
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Shenk departed the Rifle airport for Kentucky. He crashed the single-engine Cessna 210 Centurian aircraft in a neighborhood just a few hundred yards from his destination, Bowman Field. Before skidding into some trees, the plane landed in the front yard of a house.
One of the neighbors who helped put out the blaze caused by the crash said that Shenk "was laying crossways on the seat and his shirt had burned off. Skin was peeling off his head and one of his arms. His ears also appeared to be burned. And he was shaking violently."
Shenk was hospitalized at the burn unit at University Hospital in Louisville, Ky.
"I spoke to one of his sons, and it looks like he has a serious injury," Rabbi Mendel Mintz of Aspen said. "He has a lot of burns to his body."
Initial reports were that Shenk's situation was dire. But as of last night, his condition appeared to have improved.
Friends rallied in his name, holding a prayer service at the Jewish Community Center Chabad of Aspen. "We had about 30 people show up at very short notice, just by e-mail," Mintz said. "We cited some prayers and Psalms." "In my opinion, he is what a Jew should represent." [postindependent]