5 killed in Calif. plane crash after pilot takes off without clearance

Five people were killed in a plane crash on California’s Catalina Islands after the small aircraft took off from the airport without clearance.

The twin-engine Beechcraft 95 crashed just after takeoff around 8 p.m. Tuesday night about a mile west from the Catalina Airport near the island city of Avalon, according to the Federal Aviation Administration.

The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department’s Avalon Station received an S.O.S. message one of the plane’s occupants notifying them that a crash had occurred, officials said.

Five adult victims — including the plane’s owner, 73-year-old flight instructor Ali Reza Safai — were located and declared dead at the crash site.  It remains unclear who was piloting the plane.

While the cause of the crash remains under investigation, airport officials say the plane was not permitted to depart the airport, which was closed at the time of the crash, The Press-Telegram reported.

The airport, which sits some 1,6000 feet above sea level, operates between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. daily, however pilots are permitted to arrive and depart after 5 p.m. as long as they pre-arrange their trip with the airport, general manager Carl True told the paper. 

The plane had arrived around 6:20 p.m., officials said.

“He pre-arranged for his arrival after 5 p.m.,” True said, “but not for the takeoff and he was advised of that.”

Incoming or outgoing flights are not allowed after sunset as the airport is not equipped to operate at nighttime, and lacks lights along its 3,000-foot runway.

Although the pilot was not given clearance, the move was not considered illegal, True noted.

In addition to Safai, the other occupants of the plane were identified by the medical examiner’s office on Thursday as Haris Ali, 33, and Margaret Mary Fenner, 55. The other two occupants have only been identified as men in their 30s, pending family notification of their deaths, officials said.

The Los Angeles Sheriff’s Office’s Special Enforcement Bureau released photos of the wreckage on social media, showing the mangled plane on the side hill. The plane’s tail appeared to have broken off, the images show.

“When the deputies and the search and rescue and the fire guys all got there, they saw the tail of the plane down about 300 feet,” Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Sgt. Grayson Kline told KTLA. “You couldn’t see it from the road.”

Safai was a flight instructor at Santa Monica Airport and ran Santa Monica Aviation before closing its doors in 2018, according to the National Business Aviation Association. He kept his plane at the airport, but It’s unclear if he was the pilot at the time of the crash.

Proteus Flight school, another Santa Monica airport business, said Safair was assisting Proteus members who were stranded on the island.

“His spirit of camaraderie and generosity was evident when he learned that a Proteus airplane was stranded at Catalina Airport due to mechanical issues yesterday,” Proteus said in the statement. 

“Without hesitation, he volunteered to assist in retrieving the stranded occupants, who were left without transport or lodging at the top of Catalina Island.”