Brownsville minister dies in plane crash at Weslaco airport

WESLACO - Federal aviation investigators hope to learn more today about a plane crash at Mid Valley Airport that left a Brownsville minister dead.

Emergency management officials believe Ralph Copeland, 70, flew his single-engine Beechcraft Bonanza into a fence bordering the facility during an attempt to land just before 11 a.m. Friday.

The impact killed Copeland and left his passenger - Aaron Jay Voreis, 38, of Brownsville - injured, said Weslaco police spokesman David Molina.

Voreis was airlifted to Valley Baptist Medical Center in Harlingen for examination of a head wound but was seen walking around the crash site shortly after the wreck.

"The passenger was alert and talking," Molina said.

As dusk fell Friday, investigators from the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board arrived to inspect the scene.

Copeland's plane still lay mangled along the fence line's perimeter on Joe Stephens Road. Questions surrounding the cause of the crash remained unanswered.

Flight records indicate he took off from the Brownsville-South Padre Island International Airport just after 9 a.m. Friday and landed at the South Texas International Airport in Edinburg less than 20 minutes later. The two may have been returning to Brownsville when the plane went down, Weslaco Emergency Management Coordinator George Garrett said.

Copeland, an experienced pilot, had held a license to fly since 1973, according to FAA records. Voreis obtained a student license just last month.

Copeland and his wife Trudy moved to Brownsville about four years ago where he built from the ground up the New Harvest Ministries Christian Church on El Jardin Road.

The crash was the first fatality at the Weslaco airport since the June 1998 wreck of a Cessna two-seater that claimed the life of student pilot Abraham Tanus Jr., 15, and his flight instructor - 31-year-old Gregory Carey, of Harlingen.