BY DAN HILDEBRAN
A 46-year-old aerobatics pilot was killed after his plane spiraled out of control and spun to the ground during the Krawlin’ for the Fallen event at the Keystone Heights airport on Saturday, November 8.
Mark Warren Cilliers was well known at the Keystone Heights airport. He was also a noted figure at his home airport in St. Augustine, and at the Palatka Municipal Airport, where his business, Cilliers Aviation, is based.
Bradford County Sheriff Gordon Smith said first reports of the crash reached dispatchers at 10:41 a.m. The impact was reported to be in the Bradford County portion of airport property.
Bradford County Manager Scott Kornegay said the plane landed on the airfield, a considerable distance from the Krawlin for the Fallen event.
“It was an acrobatic plane,” he wrote in a text message, “and it appeared to witnesses that the plane spun out of control and into the ground. The plane was fully engulfed in flames on impact, but we had special event staff, as well as a supervisor and an in-service engine on site for the Krawlin event. They were en route before the plane hit the ground. Quick attack on the fire kept it from spreading through the airfield.”
Smith said the Florida Highway Patrol took control of the scene and initiated an investigation, while local officials notified the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board.
Nearly two hours after the accident, Airport Manager Craig Coon said he and his staff had completed the facility’s post-crash checklist and that the airport had reopened for flight operations.
Exceptional aerobatic pilot
The St. Augustine Airport on its Facebook page states, “Our hearts are heavy as we remember aviation legend Warren Cilliers — an exceptional aerobatic pilot, talented mechanic, and dear friend to so many in the aviation community.”
Born and trained in South Africa, Cilliers served in the South African Air Force from 2003 through 2007.
For the next eight years, he worked as the director of maintenance for an aircraft business in St. Augustine before launching Cilliers Aviation in 2016.
Cilliers was also a Red Bull Air Race technician for Team 99 Mike Goulian.
Other fatalities connected with the airport
Cilliers’s death marks the fourth fatality associated with the Keystone Heights Airport over the past five years, and the sixth since 2016.
On December 26, 2016, Lawtey business owner David Starling, 41, left the Keystone Heights Airport with his son Hunter, 8, and girlfriend Kim Smith, 42, bound for the Gatlinburg-Pigeon Forge Airport in Tennessee.
Although he was not instrument-rated, clouds and rain forced Starling to descend during the approach to Gatlinburg under instrument flight rules.
Moments before air traffic controllers lost contact with the plane, radar indicated it was at an altitude of 5,400 feet, near Mt. LeConte, which has an elevation of around 6,500 feet.
The plane’s wreckage was later discovered on an unnamed ridge about 15 miles from the airport.
On November 14, 2020, Miami skydiver Yuset Hernandez, 51, died after his parachute failed to open during a practice before the Krawin’ for the Fallen 4×4 charity event.
Brad Smith of the Bradford County Sheriff’s Office said video of the incident showed that the 51-year-old’s primary chute failed to deploy, and Hernandez was unable to deploy his secondary chute in time.
Around 150 volunteers searched the woods near the airport for several hours before the Miami man’s body was found.
On March 22, 2022, Marianne Fox, 49, was piloting an Extra NG aerobatic plane when she departed Keystone Heights around 4:45 p.m. She was flying with her fiancée, Jim Bourke, president of the International Aerobatic Club. Bourke was in a separate Extra NG. Fox overshot the runway in St. Augustine, overturned, and landed upside down in a marsh beyond the landing strip. The 49-year-old survived the impact, telling the tower, “I had too much speed; I should have come in slower.”
However, by the time rescuers arrived on the scene in airboats, the water level in the cockpit had risen, and the pilot was no longer visible. Rescuers extracted Fox from the plane 50 minutes after the crash. The cause of death was drowning.
On November 14, 2023, Adrien James Valentine, 21, crashed his Piper PA-28-180 in the Paynes Prairie Preserve State Park near Micanopy.
The Melrose resident had departed Kissimmee Gateway Airport and was bound for Keystone Heights.
According to an NTSB report, the 2020 Keystone Heights High School graduate made several erratic 360-degree turns, as well as numerous climbs and descents to a maximum altitude of 6,900 feet and a minimum altitude of 500 feet between 1:35 p.m. and 2:09 p.m. before losing radar contact.
“Preliminary review of air traffic control communications revealed that during the erratic maneuvering, the pilot called ‘mayday’ and stated he ‘was lost in weather,’” the report states. “During this period, the pilot reported multiple times that he was having issues with his instruments, he ‘mistakenly flew into weather,’ ‘it’s completely white,’ and he could not see anything outside.”
