2 Killed as Plane Crashes, Burns at Field in La Verne

A man and woman were killed Friday when their single-engine plane, engulfed in black smoke, crashed after aborting a landing at Brackett Field in La Verne, near the Los Angeles County Fairgrounds, authorities said.

Officials late Friday afternoon said they had not yet determined the identities of the dead pilot and his passenger, who were burned beyond recognition. The Los Angeles County coroner’s office planned to use dental records to identify them, La Verne police said.

No one on the ground was hurt.

Federal Aviation Administration officials said the accident at the county-owned airfield occurred about 1:15 p.m., just after the pilot cut short a landing attempt and radioed the air traffic control tower of unspecified difficulties.

The pilot then notified the tower that he would make a second landing attempt, said Fred O’Donnell, spokesman for the FAA in Los Angeles. Controllers in the tower received no response from the pilot when they tried to call his attention to black smoke surrounding the plane.

The Cessna 210, normally a four- or six-passenger plane, crashed in a grassy area just off the western end of the runway.

The airfield is west of the Los Angeles County Fairgrounds in Pomona and east of the Puddingstone Reservoir.

Officials late Friday had not determined where the flight originated.

Witnesses, including a tow truck driver, said the plane seemed to come down gently, La Verne Police Capt. Dee Griggs said. “But shortly thereafter, the plane caught fire and burned,” Griggs said.

The FAA said National Transportation Safety Board investigators were called to the scene.