Pilot Killed as Plane Nose-Dives After Takeoff

An Oxnard pilot died and his passenger was seriously injured Friday when a small plane they were flying lost power after takeoff from the Santa Paula Airport and crashed into the Santa Clara River as they tried to return to the airport.

The pilot of the two-seat Grumman airplane was a member of a reserve helicopter squadron at Point Mugu Naval Air Station. Witnesses said the craft appeared to be experiencing problems as it flew at a low altitude a mile west of the airport.

“It wasn’t right, the way the engine was going,” said 11-year-old Jason Cook, who was playing in his family’s back yard a half-mile away when he heard the scream of an accelerating engine and looked up. “It was only a few feet up--25 or 30 feet--then went into a spiral and hit.”

The pilot was pinned in the craft and unconscious when the first person reached the site. He was later pronounced dead at the scene.

“I tried to get to the guy, but I couldn’t lift the plane up myself,” said Bernie Noriega, who drove the bulldozer he was operating across a three-foot-deep river channel to reach the crash site. Noriega said he doused a small fire that broke out after the plane nose-dived into the shallow river.

The passenger, identified as Peter Dirkers, 24, of Oxnard was flown to Ventura County Medical Center, where he was reported in guarded condition with a compound fracture to his hip and head injuries.

Another witness, Gonzalo Castaneda, said the men were apparently trying to turn back toward the Santa Paula Airport when the crash occurred.

“As the pilot did a 180-degree turn, the plane went upside down and then--boom--he hit the water,” Castaneda said.

Rescuers found the leased plane upside down, its cockpit submerged in about four feet of water. The injured passenger had managed to free himself.

“The passenger was outside the plane, screaming in agonizing pain,” said Santa Paula Police Agent Greg Guilin. “The pilot was trapped in the plane, his head under the water. We pulled him out and tried resuscitation, but unfortunately he had been under too long.”

The pilot, a man in his mid-20s, whose name was not released pending notification of next of kin, was identified as a member in the Helicopter Combat Support Special Squadron Five at Point Mugu’s Naval Air Station. The reserve unit, which is trained to search and rescue downed pilots, was deployed during operation Desert Storm.

The crash was the fourth fatal accident in the last three years at or near the Santa Paula Airport, a private airfield built by local ranchers in 1930. The tiny airport operates without a control tower because it has no commercial traffic that would require one.

In August, 1992, two planes collided while approaching the airport from the east, killing a pilot from the San Joaquin Valley town of Buttonwillow when his plane plunged into two houses on Santa Clara Street and burst into flames.

The previous year, a helicopter carrying film actor Kirk Douglas strayed over the runway on takeoff and crashed into a small plane, killing two people and injuring three. Two months later, a veteran airline pilot and a passenger were killed when their hand-built plane lost power on takeoff and crashed.

Jim Cunningham, a pilot who has flown from Santa Paula Airport on many occasions, said at the scene of Friday’s crash that the accident appeared to have resulted from an attempted turn without sufficient air speed.

“It would be a classic mistake,” Cunningham said. “If he lost his engine after takeoff, it would explain why he dropped when he tried to turn.”

Investigators from the Federal Aviation Administration and National Transportation Safety Board are scheduled to arrive in Santa Paula this morning to begin piecing together what went wrong.

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Times correspondent Scott Hadly contributed to this story.