Pilot and four occupants of house in Yorba Linda, southeast of Los Angeles, found dead after incident

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

Five people have died in Southern California after a small plane crashed into a house on Sunday, setting the home on fire.

Orange County Sheriff’s Cory Martino said the pilot died as well as four occupants of the home in Yorba Linda, which is about 35 miles (56km) southeast of Los Angeles.

Martino said two other people had been taken to hospital with moderate injuries.

A spokesman with the National Transportation Safety Board said the twin-engine Cessna 414A crashed shortly after taking off from a nearby airport.

Video showed plane parts scattered on the ground and on rooftops and residents of the neighbourhood trying to fight the blaze caused by the crash with garden hoses as black clouds of smoke rose into the sky.

Eliott Simpson, an aviation accident investigator, said debris was scattered over four blocks and a nearby elementary school will be closed tomorrow as they investigate.

Pokey Sanchez, an assistant chief with the Orange County Fire Department, said firefighters planned to sift through the badly burned two-story house in case there were additional victims of the Sunday afternoon crash.

One witness told local media that the people inside the house were hosting a Super Bowl party at the time.

“It was a boom, pop. I run outside thinking somebody hit my daughter’s car,” witness Laurie Stockstill told CBS. “I look up. I see this huge piece. I don’t know what it was. You can just watch it in slow motion. Then I see a big cloud of smoke go up. Oh my God, it was just awful. By the time I got from here to my backyard, the house was just burning.”

Associated Press contributed to this report

