March 07--The wife of a 50-year-old Chicago man killed in a paragliding crash last year has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the aircraft's pilot, claiming his negligence caused the crash.
Jeffrey Carpenter, who paid Nicholas Peterson of Sik Nik Inc. for a tandem paragliding flight out of Ottawa, Ill.-based Skydive Chicago in June, drowned when the aircraft crashed into the Fox River, according to a filing Friday in Cook County Circuit Court. Skydive Chicago is also named as a defendant in the lawsuit.
Carpenter's wife, Audrey, alleged Peterson didn't have the experience needed for the flight, flew at an unsafe altitude, used unsafe equipment, failed to inspect the paraglider properly before takeoff and flew over water without a flotation system that could have kept Carpenter from drowning, according to the lawsuit.
She is seeking at least $50,000 in damages, according to the lawsuit.
Peterson and Skydive Chicago could not immediately be reached for comment.
Carpenter and Peterson were powered-paragliding before the accident, a form of ultralight aviation involving a backpack engine and parachute. After the crash, Carpenter's friend told the Tribune that Carpenter was a very experienced skydiver but was less familiar with powered paragliding.
After Carpenter and Peterson crashed into the Fox River in Ottawa downstream from the Dayton Dam in LaSalle County, Peterson cut himself free from the parachute and was able to reach a nearby airport. He said he was unable to rescue Carpenter because the current was too strong, the Tribune reported after the crash.
Peterson told LaSalle County sheriff's deputies he was flying over the dam when the aircraft had engine problems. Rescue workers spent hours trying to reach the aircraft, which was lodged against a log 500 feet from the river's shore in fast-moving, waist-high water, before recovering Carpenter's body the morning after the crash.
lzumbach@tribpub.com
