BEATTY -- Two fliers were injured Friday evening when their small plane crashed near the airport here.

Ben Barnes, 53, a California resident, and Jerry Behm, 66, both pilots, were on their way to Las Vegas in Barnes' single-engine, four-seater Trinidad GT Friday night when they flew into severe weather.

Where they were flying from had not been determined.

The men received a report that weather conditions were very bad in Las Vegas, so they decided to land at the Beatty airport to wait out the storm.

On their first approach, however, they calculated they were too high, so they chose to turn and line up for another landing attempt. Unfortunately, perhaps because of a faulty altimeter reading, the aircraft was much too close to the ground, and as they banked the plane clipped some creosote bushes and angled into the earth, ripping off both wings and the engine.

Barnes was able to get the two of them out of the plane, but Behm was unconscious, apparently with serious head injuries.

Barnes, who suffered a broken ankle and other injuries, was able to call 911 on his cell phone, reaching the Tonopah sheriff's dispatcher, who relayed the information to Beatty.

Emergency personnel, including Nye County sheriff's deputies, local volunteer firemen and EMTs, got the call at 7:40 p.m. and responded to the airport to search for the plane and assist the victims.

Before his cell phone went dead, Barnes told the dispatcher that the downed plane was 200 yards from the runway near a chain-link fence.

Simple as that direction may sound, visibility in the darkness and rain was poor, which frustrated searchers, who made repeated passes up and down the runway and around the outside perimeter of the airport without seeing any sign of the aircraft.

Some responders began to wonder if the pilots were near a different airport altogether.

About 45 minutes into the search, Carmelo Mendoza, one of the group of firemen who had fanned out to search on foot, finally found the crash site.

The aircraft was actually down approximately a half-mile west of the airport beacon in a large fenced-in area set aside for the future development of an east-west runway.

Some of the firemen removed their turnouts and used them to cover Behm, who had either gone into shock or was close to it.

As the victims were being assisted by the ambulance crews, Barnes asked that rescuers recover his golf clubs from the wreckage.

"I don't think I'll be flying any more," he reportedly said, "so I'll be playing a lot of golf."

An EMT who rode in the ambulance to the UMC Trauma Center with the men said she was surprised at the strength of their vital signs. A check with the hospital Monday revealed that Barnes had been discharged very early Saturday morning and that Behm was listed in good condition.