A Minnesota appeals court has reversed an earlier ruling that held Cirrus Design Corp. liable for a 2003 SR22 crash that killed two men on a trip to see their sons play in a hockey tournament. The new ruling nullifies the $14.4 million verdict awarded to the families of the two men by a jury of a lower court in 2009.
The crash occurred at dawn on Jan. 18, 2003, approximately eight minutes after pilot Gary Prokop, 47, and James Kosak, 51, took off in marginal VFR conditions in north west Minnesota. According to the NTSB, the Cirrus SR22 crashed into a heavily wooded area after the pilot encountered instrument conditions. Prokop was a VFR, single-engine land pilot working on his instrument rating. He had only 19 hours in an SR22 at the time of the incident.
