Tipton Airport

Tipton Airport never saw this one coming. The 347-acre airport at Fort Meade in Anne Arundel County has grown accustomed to delays in its 13-year transition from a military airfield to a general aviation county airport. It landed on, then was quickly removed from, the Environmental Protection Agency's Superfund list of the nation's most hazardous sites. Then, when its board inched ahead on a much-delayed project to build new hangars, a rare plant was found in a drainage ditch and blocked the airport's way. "Airport management is not an exercise in instant gratification," said David Almy, Tipton Airport Authority's spokesman and an executive at a Washington aviation trade group.

A single-engine airplane crashed while trying to land at Fort Meade's Tipton Airport in Anne Arundel County yesterday, seriously injuring the pilot, authorities said. The two-seater plane came down on Old Portland Road near Route 198 in Laurel about 4:15 p.m. and skidded into a wooded area a half-mile from the runway, authorities said. The pilot, Robert R. James Jr., 60, of Emmaus, Pa., was trapped inside the cockpit when firefighters arrived. It took about 15 minutes to free him, said Sgt. Arthur Betts of the Maryland State Police.

TOMORROW Minority Business Enterprise -- The MBE committee of Anne Arundel County will meet at 5:30 p.m. to discuss the delegation and operation of the Minority Business Enterprise program. The committee meets on the second Monday of each month at the Heritage Office Complex, 2660 Riva Road, Annapolis. 410-222-7620. Ethics Commission -- The Anne Arundel County Ethics Commission will meet at 6 p.m. in Suite 110 at 2662 Riva Road, Annapolis. The commission reviews and enforces the county's code of ethics.

Soldiers at Fort Meade will perform a security exercise today that will force the post gate at Llewellyn Avenue and Route 175 to close for most of the day.The exercise, code-named Blue Canary, will simulate an attack with a chemical agent and bombs, according to post officials.Military police will do heightened security checks at the Llewellyn gate from 8 a.m. to 10 a.m., and the gate will be closed from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.Chamberlin, Chisolm and 85th Medical Battalion avenues as well as Fifth and Eighth streets on post will be affected by the exercise as well.

A pilot and a student-pilot escaped injury yesterday evening when their plane crashed into trees at Tipton Airport near Fort Meade in Anne Arundel County, a county Fire Department spokesman said. Division Chief John M. Scholz said the two occupants of a four-seat propeller-driven private plane were executing touch-and-go maneuvers at the airfield about 7 p.m. They were above a tree line west of the airfield not far from the Patuxent River when the plane apparently lost power for an unknown reason and crashed into the trees.

Driver, 19, sentenced to 18 months in jail for fatal car crash After describing the devastation of losing her only child, Sheran Booth collapsed in sobs next to her husband yesterday in an Anne Arundel County Circuit courtroom. Across the aisle, another family wept as Judge Clayton Greene Jr. sentenced James J. Carroll Jr., 19, of Severn to 18 months in jail with 2 1/2 years suspended for causing the car accident that killed his passenger, Ashley Clay Booth, 22, of Gambrills. Greene ordered that Carroll be placed on five years of supervised probation, including 100 hours of community service, after his release.

A Severna Park father and son survived the crash of a small airplane Tuesday into the back yard of a suburban Atlanta home, apparently after running out of fuel. John A. Theune, 46, and his 12-year-old son were headed to Atlanta to watch the Maryland Terrapins in the Peach Bowl college football game when the single-engine Piper Cherokee went down about 5:30 p.m. in Cobb County, Ga., about 10 miles northwest of Atlanta. No one on the ground was injured. Theune was listed in critical but stable condition last night at Grady Memorial Hospital, said Cobb County police Cpl. Dana Pierce.

Arundel planning director retires; successor named Anne Arundel County Executive John R. Leopold has announced the retirement of Lois Villemaire as his administration's planning director and named Larry Tom, a former Annapolis community development chief, as her successor. "Ms. Villemaire has served this Administration and the citizens of Anne Arundel County well over the past several months," Leopold said in a statement. "She was instrumental in a smooth transition and I applaud her hard work regarding the on-going revision of the General Development Plan."

The pilot of the single-engine plane that crashed at Tipton Airport in Anne Arundel County on Thursday, killing the pilot and a companion, did not signal any distress to the control tower, a federal investigator said yesterday. Relatives and business associates identified the two victims yesterday as Daniel Lee Eberhardt, 57, of Downers Grove, Ill., and Bobbi Getz, 56, of Pittsburgh. The preliminary investigation into the accident did not show structural or mechanical problems, said David Muzio, the lead National Transportation Safety Board crash investigator for the accident.