Friends, family members and survivors gathered at Wichita State University for the 50th anniversary of a tragic event that shook the university community and the world of college sports.
A plane carrying members of the WSU football team crashed in the Colorado mountains on October 2nd, 1970, killing 31 players, coaches and supporters and crew members. The Martin 404 plane was enroute to Logan, Utah for a game with Utah State University.
The names of the 31 victims were read during a ceremony at Cessna Stadium, and a new addition was unveiled to the Memorial 70 sculpture on the WSU campus. It is a stone marker with the names of the eight people who survived the crash.
Crash survivor Rick Stephens will begin a Ride To Remember on Saturday, and he and others will leave from the Memorial 70 site to ride bicycles on a six-day trip to Kiowa, Colorado. They plan to visit the plane crash site on Saturday, October 10th. The ride is held each year for the Memorial 70 Scholarship Fund.
