The plane crash that almost ended Lynyrd Skynyrd
Lynyrd Skynyrd had a motto when they first started making music together, “If we don’t make it, we’ll die trying.” The band was formed in 1964 and was made up of Ronnie Van Zant, Gary Rossington, Allen Collins, Larry Junstrom and Bob Burns. They had great success with hits such as ‘Sweet Home Alabama’ ‘Free Bird’ and ‘Simple Man’, but the band almost came to an abrupt end as devastation struck in October, 1977.
Just two days after releasing their album Street Survivors, Lynyrd Skynyrd performed a gig at the Greenville Memorial Auditorium. The next day, they boarded a Convair CV-240 plane, which was set to take them to Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The flight was cut short as the aircraft ran out of fuel.
The pilots tried to navigate the plane to McComb Airport when they realised that they had run out of fuel, but it soon became apparent the plane wouldn’t make it that far. Instead, they opted for an emergency landing in an open field. The aircraft came down and skimmed across a tree line before hitting a big tree and splitting into pieces.
“I remember most of it,” recalls the band’s guitarist, Gary Rossington, “the rapid descent, the screaming, my friends in pain like something out of Vietnam. Waking up with the plane door on top of me.”
The crash killed six people out of the 20 who were on board, including Robert Van Zant, Steve Gaines, Allen Collins, and backing singer Cassie Gaines. It’s a tragedy that saw the band’s career halted for over ten years and still haunts the surviving members today.
“We didn’t die, so we had unanswered questions as to why them and not us? We all believe in God because we’ve been through so much and yet we carried on. The crash has been brought up every day to us, since then. The main thing is we lost our best friends – that’s the hardest part. Our motto when we started was, ‘If we don’t make it, we’ll die trying.’ And we made it but at a terrible cost.”
The band struggled to make music after the crash, not only because of the fact a lot of them passed away in it but also because of the trauma that ensued. Grief can be tricky, and when people survive an incident that others didn’t, guilt can follow. It wasn’t until ten years later that Lynyrd Skynyrd reformed with Johnny, Ronnie Van Zant’s brother.
“We are so blessed to have all these chances,” said Rossington, “we had a second chance to do this, and we continued. What else is life about than to live it?… You’re a fool to not live your dream. It’s unbelievable people still love our music and come out for us every night. We’re thankful.”
It often takes a close brush with death to highlight the beauty of life. When Lynyrd Skynyrd eventually started performing again, they did so with a new tenacity that allowed them to enjoy the process while honouring those they loved.
