Oklahoma State University's transportation policies are under renewed scrutiny following the plane crash Thursday that killed two members of the Cowboys women's basketball coaching staff - the second fatal crash involving an OSU basketball travel party in 11 years.
After the first crash, which claimed two men's basketball players and eight others affiliated with the program in January 2001, the university's travel policy was modified to require at least two turbine engines for planes transporting student-athletes. However, the policy allows coaches to make their own decisions regarding their own air transportation.
OSU women's coach Kurt Budke and assistant Miranda Serna were killed aboard a single-engine Piper that went down 45 miles outside Little Rock, Ark. Weather has been ruled out as a cause, and National Transportation Safety Administration officials have said there is no indication that 84-year-old pilot Olin Bransetter, an OSU booster, would not have been qualified to fly the plane.
Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin said Monday that a university review of travel guidelines was appropriate, stating that OSU and other schools may want to adopt the policy in place for her own travel. "We do have standards for my flying," she said, as reported by The Oklahoman. "We have two pilots and a twin-engine airplane. That is something that OSU wanted when it came to the teams. That is something that certainly President [Burns] Hargis and I'm sure the other universities will consider when they talk about what they're going to do in the future. I think it's a discussion that we do need to have."
Stefanie Pemper, who as Navy women's basketball coach only flies commercial, says she understands why some coaches charter flights, particularly when a recruiting trip takes them into rural parts of the country. Just getting to an airport offering commercial flights can take as long as the flight itself. "Maybe that's time away from their families, and maybe those schools need to change rules if necessary and let those families fly with the team," Pemper told the Washington Post. "I mean, I don't know, but it's just really, really sad, and I just hope people really think about safety and if ways could be improved to protect these athletic programs and players and coaches."
Maryland women's coach Brenda Frese added of inherent travel risk, "I've become very much more in tune and probably sensitive to that since having kids, but that can happen with you just getting in your car. It can come at anytime, obviously, and you have that perspective of just how fragile life is."
