Dead California candidate leads in race
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}A candidate for a seat on a Central California board may win his race, despite having died last month in a small plane crash.
Kern County Elections Chief Karen Rhea told the Bakersfield Californian on Monday that votes are still being counted, but 68-year-old Michal Hill is a front-runner among three candidates vying for a pair of seats on the Mojave Air and Space Port board.
A flight instructor and former Navy test pilot, Hill died in October when a two-seater T-67 Firefly he piloted crashed about 100 miles east of Bakersfield. Twenty-seven-year-old student, Ilam Zigante, also died in the crash.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Rhea says that if Hill is elected, the position will remain vacant.
She says the board could then appoint somebody or hold a special election.
The port serves as a flight test facility.