2 Killed in Light-Plane Crash

PACOIMA — A light plane that developed engine trouble after taking off from Whiteman Airport on Thursday night crashed into two houses and burst into flames, killing two passengers and setting the houses afire.

The pilot escaped the wreckage but was hospitalized in critical condition with cuts and burns.

It was at least the sixth crash in the neighborhood since May of last year involving planes coming to and from Whiteman Airport. The prior crashes caused at least one death.

Several people were in the houses at the time, and firefighters expressed amazement that nobody on the ground was hurt.

“We were very fortunate here tonight,” said Los Angeles Fire Department Inspector Alan Masumoto. “Many, many lives were spared.”

The Red Cross said it would find shelter for 10 residents of the houses, including several children between 8 and 13.

It was not raining when the single-engine white Ryan Avion took off from Whiteman Airport about 6:15, said the Los Angeles office of the Federal Aviation Administration. Visibility was 30 miles with a 6,000-foot ceiling, the FAA said.

The plane “developed some technical problems,” Masumoto said. It crashed into two neighboring houses in the 13100 block of Hoyt Street, about four blocks from the airport, killing two men on board.

Their identities were not disclosed until their families could be notified.

Tommie Mendoza, 58, who lives about a block from the crash site, said she and her daughter heard a loud explosion and ran from the house.

“I heard this smash; I ran to the alley,” she said. When she got there she found a man climbing over a fence. He told her he was a flight instructor, she said.

“That’s when I hugged him and put him on the floor,” she said. “His hair was all burned and he was full of blood.”

“He kept saying, ‘I tried to help them, but the flames were too high,’ ” referring to the two men who perished in the crash, she said.

The instructor gave Mendoza his phone number to call his family and asked Mendoza’s daughter, Veronica Sanchez, to call the airport’s control tower.

The man was “very coherent,” Sanchez said, marveling at his escape from the burning wreckage.

“The flames were strong; I don’t know how he got out,” she said.

The instructor, a man in his 40s, was the plane’s pilot, authorities said. He was taken to Providence Holy Cross Medical Center in Mission Hills, where he was listed in critical condition, said Los Angeles Fire Department spokesman Jim Wells.

At least 50 firefighters fought the blaze, which did about $120,000 damage to the structures and contents, Wells said.

A firefighter was also taken to Providence Holy Cross, where he was treated for a forehead cut and was expected to be released shortly, Wells said.

Alfonse Padilla and his wife, Griselda Coronado, both 22, were sitting on the steps of their apartment building when they saw the plane fall across the street. Padilla said he heard explosions before the plane crashed but saw no flames or smoke as the plane came down.

“The house broke, and the plane was in pieces; then the fire started,” Padilla said.

“We were going to move already; now this is the last straw,” Padilla said. “Other planes have also fallen. This is not the first time.”

Sanchez said that when she saw the plane approaching, she thought, “He’s going to crash. We’ve seen that happen a lot here.”

Shoba Srinivasan, 28, of Arcadia, a violinist from the Santa Monica Symphony Orchestra, was killed in a crash in March. The plane in which she was a passenger had just taken off from Whiteman and was apparently trying to get back to the runway when it crashed into a converted garage at a vacant house.

In July of last year a student pilot crash-landed a single engine airplane in the front yard of a home in the 13300 block of Desmond Street in Pacoima.

On May 18, 1996, a student pilot crashed her single-engine Cessna into a power pole near Foothill Boulevard and Yarnell Street in Sylmar. Less than an hour later, a twin-engine Beechcraft 55 carrying three people crash-landed on the 15th hole of the Hansen Dam Golf Course after taking off from Whiteman.

Despite the string of crashes--in which there were no serious injuries--FAA officials recommended no changes in operations at Whiteman.

Jose Cardenas is a Times staff writer; Claire Vitucci is a correspondent.