The home-built, single-engine fixed-wing plane crashed north of Marysville on Aug. 14, killing pilot Greg Capes. (Marysville Police Department, file)

The home-built, single-engine fixed-wing plane crashed north of Marysville on Aug. 14, killing pilot Greg Capes. (Marysville Police Department, file)

New report gives clues in fatal plane crash in Marysville

Witnesses heard loud engine revving or misfiring before the crash killed pilot Greg Capes, 64.

MARYSVILLE — A pilot may have been in the sky for less than 10 minutes before his small plane crashed into a field in Marysville last month, according to an initial report by the National Transportation Safety Board.

Greg Capes, 64, died on impact. He owned a home in Frontier Airpark, a small community built around an airstrip north of Lake Stevens.

Capes took off from the private runway around 6:45 p.m. Aug. 14, according to the preliminary report made public in late August. He was flying a single-engine Murphy Moose built from a kit.

A final report has not been completed by the NTSB.

Capes did not file a flight plan. He was piloting the craft with an experimental certificate. The plane had a Vedeneyev M14-PF engine built in Russia, according to the Federal Aviation Administration. Witnesses told investigators the plane was flying unusually low, and the engine made a sound like it was revving or misfiring.

In north Marysville, the plane sharply banked over a field. It looked to be out of control, eyewitnesses reported.

Capes’ aircraft crashed around 6:54 p.m. in the 15700 block of 51st Avenue NE, about a mile south of Arlington Municipal Airport.

Capes died of blunt trauma, according to the Snohomish County Medical Examiner’s Office.

He’d held a private single-engine pilot’s license since at least 2010.

The wreckage was moved to a secure place for further examination.

Meanwhile, investigators spoke with people who saw the accident.

“One witness stated that the airplane appeared to be in a nosedive, during which, it sounded like the pilot added full power,” the report says. “Shortly thereafter, she saw a cloud of dust.”

Caleb Hutton: 425-339-3454; chutton@heraldnet.com. Twitter: @snocaleb.

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