Integrity owners report to office after plane crash

For Integrity Home Care co-owner Paul Reinert, business as usual doesn’t exist anymore.

“Something has changed with me, and I can’t quite put my finger on it,” Reinert said days after surviving a company plane crash.

Reinert is one of four Integrity Home Care officials thankful to have their feet on solid ground after their six-seat aircraft went down Dec. 12 short of Springfield’s Downtown Airport on Evangel University-owned property adjacent to the school.

Springfield Business Journal visited Integrity’s headquarters in northeast Springfield on Dec. 17, two days after employees welcomed Reinert back with emotion-filled embraces.

Co-owner Greg Horton, who suffered a broken arm and deeply bruised feet sitting next to pilot and interim Vice President Bill Perkin, also was part of a Dec. 17 reception. To hear Horton tell it: “It’s like we were able to go to our own funeral, but we’re not done yet.”

All four Integrity managers flying on the company’s recently purchased 2006 Piper Saratoga were in good condition and recovering at press time.

The accident comes six weeks after the airplane acquisition, and Federal Aviation Administration records indicate the plane’s registration is still pending. But that doesn’t mean the aircraft was operated illegally, said FAA spokeswoman Elizabeth Cory.

Cory said the pending status was an administrative matter, and an investigation of the accident would likely continue into the new year. She declined to comment further on the investigation.

Reinert and fellow passenger Amy Ford, director of hospice, suffered only minor bumps and bruises. Perkin sustained the most damage with multiple broken bones. He took a hit in his rib cage and one of his shoulders and sustained some foot damage, Reinert said. Both Perkin and Horton had their lower legs trapped in their front seats and the jaws of life was brought in to cut them out from the twisted metal.

K.C. moves
The foursome were in Kansas City to help prepare for the opening of a 15,000-square-foot office in Lee’s Summit and to meet with employees joining the Integrity team as part of the acquisition of Omega Health Care, a hospice company.

The new office replaces the company’s Independence office to serve that market. It opened quietly in the wake of the crash on Dec. 15. Reinert said the 15-employee Omega deal is expected to close before Christmas.

The Springfield-based home health care provider operates four offices in the greater Kansas City area, as well as a presence in Columbia, Joplin and Lebanon. It has about 250 management and operations’ employees companywide and around 2,700 caregivers in the field, Reinert said, with about 700 of those working in the Kansas City area.

“This allows us to have a licensure and grow our hospice up there,” Reinert said, adding it was a complicated transaction that included an undisclosed cash amount and the assumption of debt via a receivership.

The co-owner said company officials flew to area offices over the past 18 months or so after Perkin came on board as a marketing and operational matters consultant.

Perkin owns ABC-affiliate KSPR through Perkin Media LLC, and was a pilot with access to a plane. Being able to fly to Columbia and Kansas City on a whim had become a hit with Reinert and Horton, but Perkin shared ownership, and so the company began earlier this year looking to buy its own aircraft, which they found for  under $400,000.

Sudden descent
Reinert said the accident happened quickly and many of the details only become known to him through others.

Initially, the plane clipped a Verizon cell tower around Chestnut Expressway and Boonville Avenue after the aircraft came in low beneath the clouds. They were preparing for an instrument landing when Perkin realized he could see beneath the clouds, and began to cross the city to land at the downtown airport.

After contact with the tower, the engine ran for a period of seconds as gas gushed out of the side of the plane. A piece of metal extending from the top of the tower cut through one of the wings, but a structural spar in the middle of the wing was stronger than the tower medal, preventing a direct fall from 500 feet. The engine went silent as the plane began to glide.

Reinert said the only words he remembers exchanged were from Ford asking what they should do. “We pray,” he replied.

On the sudden descent, Perkin spotted a dark patch of vacant land to set the aircraft down. They clipped a tree and spun around but avoided buildings and other trees. As it landed, Reinert said he bit his tongue and bumped his head, but he and Ford were fine.

Their colleagues up front were alive but trapped. Reinert said they later learned each of them prayed silently in the seconds it took to fly the mile and a half from the tower to the Evangel-owned lot.  

“After the engine stopped, I’m guessing it was no more than 10 or 15 seconds. And I didn’t know what to expect, but I was at peace,” he said. “There was no panic.”

Airplane aftermath
Reinert said he doubts the company would be in the market to buy another plane. It’s also not entirely clear if Perkin would want to continue in his consulting and interim vice president role after he recovers. The details could be sorted out after the first of the year, he said.

The details of business don’t carry as much meaning these days for Reinert. He’s changed, he said.

In the immediate aftermath of the Friday night accident, Reinert wrote an email to the staff, letting them know what he knew. On Monday morning, he’d tell them more after visits with Perkin and Horton in the hospital. Perkin was still hospitalized on Dec. 17.

Reinert said Ford told him she couldn’t stop hugging her kids. He encouraged her to take time off work around Christmas.

The plane was insured, and he talked with FAA officials and the insurance company following the accident, but five days after the crash, he hadn’t determined the material impacts of the event. Reinert still didn’t have his wallet or briefcase – now pieces of evidence in the FAA’s investigation. No matter. They were alive.

“Some say extraordinary luck; I believe God had his hand on us,” Reinert said. “This is a time of peace and celebration in Christ’s birth, and I think it’s important that we understand that God will be willing to forgive us for being a little patient with ourselves and not feeling the need to press so hard to get everything done.”[[In-content Ad]]