A small plane piloted by former Wal-Mart CEO Bill Simon made an emergency landing in Arkansas on Martin Luther King Junior Boulevard Tuesday morning.
The plane reportedly began to experience oil pressure issues immediately after take off from Bentonville Municipal Airport at 9:35 a.m., Fayetteville Sergeant Craig Stout said, according to KFSM-TV. Simon attempted to land at Drake Field in Fayetteville, but after a severe loss of oil pressure, he deployed the emergency parachute and made a slow landing.
The plane, a fixed-wing, single-engine Cirrus SR22T, had reached an altitude of 9,800 feet at about 9:45 a.m. when it started to descend before dropping almost 9,000 feet at about 250 mph within a 30-second window. The plane deployed its parachute five minutes later at about 2,200 feet and floated down to the ground.
In addition to Simon, co-pilot Cliff Slinkard and passenger Maurice Willis were also on board. All three were taken to the hospital with minor injuries, along with Shakemia Harris, a pickup truck driver who was hit by the plane as it came down, police said, according to Sport Act. Harris sustained non-life-threatening injuries, according to police.
Simon, who led Wal-Mart U.S. operations from 2010 to 2014, was en route to Waco, Texas, where he teaches at Baylor University, according to WBNS-10TV.
FAA and National Transportation Safety Board investigators are coming from Clinton, Ark., to investigate the emergency landing.
