San Clemente Couple Die as Plane Breaks Apart, Crashes : Tragedy: Investigators study why the single-engine craft fell in pieces into a San Joaquin Valley cornfield, killing newlyweds Gordon and Pauline Hatch.

A San Clemente couple died when their small airplane apparently split apart in mid-flight and crashed in a cornfield near Hanford in the San Joaquin Valley, authorities said Thursday.

Gordon Randall Hatch, 65, and Pauline Cook Hatch, 56, who were married about six weeks ago, were found in the wreckage of a Beech A-36 single-engine aircraft, which went down at 5:44 p.m. Wednesday, said Kings County Sheriff Ken Marvin.

Pieces of the plane were spread over a 1 1/4-mile rural area, said Carol Long, a Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman in Los Angeles. A local newspaper reported that debris was strewn over several residences and cotton and cornfields about four miles northeast of Hanford.

Some residents said they heard a high-pitched whine and an explosion before the plane hit the ground, but Marvin discounted those statements.

“There are conflicting statements among the witnesses,” Marvin said. “Some people said they heard a whine, and some said they heard pops or popping noises. In fact, we do not have evidence of any explosion of any sort and there was no indication of a fire either.

“Of course, we are waiting for a full investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board,” he said.

The sheriff, who visited the wreckage site, said that usually an explosion would push out the metal fuselage and there would be soot or black marks where fire had ignited.

“We have no evidence of that happening, none whatsoever,” Marvin said.

The woman was found 500 yards from the fuselage, still strapped in her seat, while her husband, a pilot with 25 years’ experience, was in the fuselage, according to the sheriff.

Hatch was flying under visual flight rules, Long said, and had filed a flight plan when he left Long Beach Airport headed to Columbia Airport in the Sierra foothills, about 40 miles northeast of Modesto.

Long said that witness reports indicated “an in-flight breakup” but apparently there was no indication of fire on-board the aircraft.

According to aviation experts, a structural failure in flight is unusual.

Experts said planes can break up when they are put through sudden, violent maneuvers that exceed the aircraft’s capacity, or due to age and metal fatigue.

The exact cause of the crash, which occurred in sunny, 80-degree weather and 10-mile visibility, is under investigation by the NTSB, which had dispatched an investigator to the site Thursday.

Marvin said the crash left rescue workers and deputies emotionally shaken.

“We don’t get plane crashes around here that often,” he said. “And, it’s unusual. How often do you hear of one coming apart in the air?”

Hatch, who owned and managed two mobile home parks in Apple Valley and one near Bakersfield, and his wife were headed to their mountain cabin in the eastern Sierra, said Hatch’s son, Michael Hatch, 38, an airline pilot from Oceanside.

“We’re all really kind of devastated right now,” he said. “I’m baffled hearing that the airplane came down in two pieces because that means either an explosion or catastrophic failure.”

Hatch said his father had been flying for more than 25 years and was proficient behind the controls of the Beech aircraft.

“He was taking a pleasure flight up to his cabin for the rest of the week,” the son said. “They had been married only six weeks.”

Michael Hatch said that Pauline Hatch, who was from Scottsdale, Ariz., was learning how to operate and help manage the mobile home parks. She had children from a previous marriage, he said.