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, assistant road manager Dean Kilpatrick, along with Pilot Walter McCreary, and co-pilot William Gray. Some of the guys were playing poker. One such silent witness has found a way to talk. The news was shocking -- a plane crash near my hometown of McComb, Miss. It was there where he was found dead in his room on July 27. I was a young graphic artist at the time. There are just too few physical landmarks. He later caused a controversy by giving a lurid account of Cassie Gaines' final moments on a VH1 Behind The Music special about the band, claiming that the backing singer's throat was cut from ear to ear and that she bled to death in his arms. he said, barely able to get his English to suit his thoughts. The tour is scheduled to run through mid-September. But one thing I'm proud of. On October 20, 1977, Cassie Gaines died of non-communicable disease. Shining from what seemed to be a small house on a dairy farm. For members Gary Rossington and Allen Collins, the weight of what happened seemed to push down on them the most. Making the original release cover more valuable to collectors than the second cover released just a few weeks after the album hit the shelves. Deceased people hanging from trees, the other survivors moaning for help of any kind, and completely surrounded by a black swamp whose canopy is blocking the only light that is trying so desperately to shine through. Two of them were crew members, pilot Walter McReary and co-pilot William Gray, the rest were band members and roadies. The will to carry on was strong, however, Pyle being a US Marine, would live out the phrase Semper Fidelis which means always faithful. Most of the 20 survivors were taken to Southwest Regional Medical Center in McComb, where the lobby had been transformed into a makeshift emergency treatment center to quickly deal with the onslaught of plane crash victims. He lifted one after another and shuffled them to others outside. One of them being completely decapitated. An old high school friend, Bobby McDaniel, posted a photo and a comment about a name-carved tree from the crash site. How did Cassie Gaines of the southern rock band Lynyrd Skynyrd die? - Yen Soon after the plane would begin to jerk and shake violently. All reality had been broken and none of the surviving members would ever be the same or view life the same again. Things were going so well. Performance & security by Cloudflare. It was Dr. Hank Lewis, a month shy of 78-years-old.