October 25 marks the 10th anniversary of an event that shocked the worlds of aviation and golf when one of the game’s greats–Payne Stewart–lost his life after the Learjet in which he was traveling suffered a loss of pressurization during a flight from Orlando to Dallas. The NBAA held that year’s convention in Atlanta less than two weeks before that tragic day, when Stewart and five others aboard the Learjet 35 fell unconscious from the effects of hypoxia about 15 minutes after departing Orlando International Airport. They may have perished by the time the airplane finally crashed four hours later in a field near Aberdeen, S.D.
Only a month earlier Stewart had made one of his last public appearances in a stirring come-from-behind U.S. win in the 1999 Ryder Cup in Brookline, Mass., and only four months earlier won the U.S. Open at Pinehurst No. 2 in North Carolina.
Known not only for his golfing prowess but also for his signature fashion sense (Stewart wore ivy caps and a cross between plus-four trousers and knickers–a throwback to golf’s early days), Stewart collected 24 professional wins, including 13 PGA tour victories, before his death at the age of 42.
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