Van Zant died on impact from head injuries suffered after the aircraft struck a tree. Bandmates Steve Gaines and Cassie Gaines, along with assistant road manager Dean Kilpatrick, pilot Walter …

On 20 October, 1977 Lynyrd Skynyrd’s Ronnie Van Zant and Steve Gaines tragically died in a plane crash.

Feb 4, 2025 · Ronnie Van Zant died instantly from blunt force trauma to the head. Guitarist Steve Gaines, assistant road manager Dean Kilpatrick, pilot Walter McCreary, and co-pilot William Gray Jr. …

Jun 13, 2022 · At the height of Lynyrd Skynyrd's fame, 29-year-old frontman Ronnie Van Zant was killed in a brutal plane crash outside Gillsburg, Mississippi on October 20, 1977

Aug 8, 2025 · No one who survived that day can forget that Van Zant, then 29, had repeatedly proclaimed that he would not live to see his 30th birthday. He died 87 days before that pivotal date. …

Jun 24, 2024 · Ronnie Van Zant died from a single blow to the head. Artemis Pyle believed it could have been the large television or video cassette recorder they had on board that killed him when it flew …

Aug 27, 2025 · For years, Lynyrd Skynyrd frontman Ronnie Van Zant claimed he would die before 30. Then when he was still 29, he was killed in a brutal plane crash in the Mississippi woods.

On October 20, 1977, they would board a flight bound for Louisiana that would crash in Gillsberg, Missippi and claim the lives of band members Ronnie Van Zant, Steve Gaines, Cassie Gaines, …

Ronnie Van Zant did not sing like a man trying to be liked. He sang like a man trying to be understood. Born in Jacksonville, Florida, he helped turn Lynyrd Skynyrd into the loudest argument for honesty in …

Decades later, he gave an account of the flight's final moments on a VH1 Behind the Music special, stating that Van Zant, who was not wearing a seat belt, was thrown violently from his seat and died …