Replica Wright Flyer III Crashes During Reenactment at Huffman Prairie
Vintage aircraft builder and pilot, Mark Dusenberry walked away without a scratch as his replica Wright Flyer III crashed into the hallowed ground in which Wilbur and Orville Wright perfected their airplane.

During the reenactment of the Wright brothers' October 5, 1905 flight here, Mr. Dusenberry's historically accurate replica, constructed like the original of spruce and ash, flew gracefully for about 40 seconds, gently turned right then clipped the ground with the lower wingtip.

The aircraft abruptly came to a halt and Mr. Dusenberry climbed from its wing, waving to signal to an assembled crowd of more than 2,500 that he was not hurt.

Just like the Wright brothers, Mr. Dusenberry is a perfectionist. After painstakingly researching the design of the original Wright Flyer III, he constructed his replica in about 10,000 hours. Then he quite literally, like the Wright brothers, taught himself to fly it. In his 100 flights, including 10 at Huffman Prairie, he had to relearn some of the same lessons the Wrights did more than 100 years ago.

His flight, though cut short, commemorated one on the same 84 acres of prairie exactly 102 years earlier when Wilbur flew almost 25 miles in 39 minutes, circling the field 29 times,at an average speed of 38 miles per hour. The flight, the longest of 1905 and longer than all of the previous years' flights combined, marked the achievement of practical flight.

Mr. Dusenberry noted that he lost both propellers and damaged the undercarriage of the plane. "It is a fairly common type of accident with these aircraft," he said. "What I broke was a bunch of sticks and put a few holes in some of my fabric. But fortunately it's all repairable. It will take time, but it will be repaired."

The soft-spoken Dusenberry reflected, "I think it's fantastic, I really think it's great," regarding his chance to recreate the Wright brothers' legacy before hundreds of Ohio elementary school children. "Hopefully it has a positive impression on the kids as far as looking at the aircraft here and thinking about technology and how things have changed over time."

Mr. Dusenberry, an engineer with the Ohio Department of Transportation from Dennison, feels a certain kinship with the Wright brothers and their quest to learn more about their fragile flying machines. Based on his study of the Wright brothers' diaries, he assesses his flying skills would equate to where Wilbur and Orville were in late 1904.