Arizona’s Chandler Municipal Airport was hit by a freak storm on Tuesday night that damaged or destroyed an estimated 30 airplanes. Local meteorologists blamed the damage on microbursts they estimated at peak speeds of around 60 mph, though the extent of the damage to some of the airplanes would suggest even stronger winds were to blame.
Flying reader and airplane owner Stephen Nolan sent us these photos of the damage. Nolan said that he lost his Piper Warrior. The light single was “picked up and moved 200-300 yards and dropped down,” Nolan wrote in an email to Flying. Another one of his airplanes, a Piper Saratoga, was parked next to the Warrior but was unscathed.
