Unconscious Pilot Lands Overcome By Fumes, His Autopilot Flies 250 Miles

A man who blacked out at the controls of his small plane flew 250 miles on autopilot and glided to a crash landing in a snowy field, waking up with injuries no more serious than a broken wrist.

Dr. Bob Frayser, a family physician, was overcome by carbon monoxide fumes about 30 minutes into an hourlong flight Saturday from his hometown of Hoisington to Topeka, 160 miles to the east.

The single-engine plane continued on course at a level altitude, crossing into Missouri and finally running out of gas as Frayser sat unconscious at the controls. The four-seat plane skidded 500 feet on its belly before crashing into a row of trees in a meadow near a home in Cairo, Mo.

Frayser, 47, said Thursday he woke up disoriented with a ringing in his ears and a terrible headache. He staggered about a quarter-mile to a house, where help was summoned.

“Most credit I give to the Lord,” he said.

Frayser walked away with a broken wrist, a few cuts around his left eye and bruises on his ribs from the seat belt.

“The man won the lottery,” Federal Aviation Administration safety inspector Jim Wesley told The Hutchinson News.

Frayser had set the autopilot of his Piper Comanche 400 soon after leaving Great Bend airport on his way to a meeting of the Board of Healing Arts. A crack in the engine’s exhaust system allowed the deadly carbon monoxide gas to seep into the cabin’s heating system.

Frayser said he remembers nothing after the first 100 miles. He was in the air about two hours and the autopilot flew at an altitude of 5,500 feet.

Steve Devenport was napping in his recliner when FrDevenport said Frayser, cold and disoriented, kept asking him how far Topeka was. Then Devenport looked out his back door and saw the tail of the plane sticking up out of the snow behind his house.

Frayser went back to work Monday.

“I had patients that needed to be seen,” he said. “Right now, I’m the only family practitioner in Hoisington.”