3 Killed as Plane Hits Fullerton Townhouse : Aviation: Private craft was trying to land at foggy airport. Pilot, passenger and sleeping resident die.

A single-engine plane trying to land in fog at Fullerton Airport crashed into a townhouse complex Monday morning, exploding in flames and killing three people.

The four-seat Piper Cherokee had left Big Bear half an hour before it slammed into a third-story bedroom half a mile from the airport, killing the pilot, his passenger and a woman asleep in the room.

“People were screaming, ‘Somebody do something!’ ” said 31-year-old Ralph Nunez, who rushed to the complex after seeing the plane go down in thick fog at 6:35 a.m. “The palm trees were in flames, and I saw a woman running out with a baby in her arms. She was screaming that her mom was trapped.”

The woman’s mother, Sharan Ernst, 43, was the only resident unable to escape the fire, which spread quickly because of the plane’s high-octane fuel, fire officials said.

Family members who were in the lower levels of the townhouse fought to save her.

“My father and I made it up two flights of stairs, but he couldn’t go any farther because of the heat and smoke,” said the woman’s son, 20-year-old Jeremy Ernst. “I couldn’t see anything, but I could feel the flames.”

The victim’s husband, Ron Ernst, had left the bedroom just moments earlier to go downstairs for his first cigarette of the day.

“It saved his life,” Fire Battalion Chief Larry Greene said. “It was fate.”

The pilot was identified as 40-year-old Mike Benson of Big Bear and his passenger as 47-year-old Les Arehart, a management analyst for Anaheim’s finance department, who lived in Big Bear on the weekends.

Because they were landing as scheduled before the tower at Fullerton Airport opened at 7 a.m., Benson had contacted air traffic controllers in San Diego. When he was about 10 miles from the Fullerton airport, he was cleared for an instrument landing, said Mitch Barker, a Federal Aviation Administration spokesman.

At that time, Barker said, Benson asked the controllers to track him by radar and tell him when he was at the first marker, four to seven miles from the beginning of the runway.

After telling the pilot that he had reached that position, the controllers asked him to contact them after he had landed to tell them that he was safe.

When a pilot reaches a certain altitude, it is up to him to decide whether to attempt to land in foggy conditions, Barker said. But he must have at least one mile of visibility or abort the landing.

Airport director Roland Elder, who arrived at the crash site about 7 a.m., said employees told him the airport had been “completely fogged in” at the time of the crash.

Dozens of residents in the eight-unit townhouse complex at 1811-17 Malvern Ave. fled with only the clothes they wore, and some made futile attempts to battle the blaze. At least 16 people were left homeless by the fire, according to the Orange County Red Cross chapter.

“I was just coming out of the shower when the whole building shook,” said 30-year-old Ed Borgett, who lives next door to the Ernsts. “Right now, I’m just thinking about my neighbor. I haven’t even begun to think about the fact that I’ve lost everything I’ve ever owned.”

Seventy firefighters arrived from three cities and the county department, but couldn’t search the building for more than five hours because floors and walls had been destroyed.

One Fullerton firefighter suffered burns on his face and arms and was taken to St. Jude Hospital in Fullerton.

John Emig, editor of the Big Bear weekly newspaper, The Grizzly, said Arehart and Benson were pilots. Emig said Benson owned the airplane and was married with children. The man’s oldest son was honored at a combination birthday and “hangar-warming” party Sunday, Emig said.

“He [Benson] had just moved his plane into a new hangar. He and another guy had kind of a hangar-warming party. His oldest son also had a birthday party,” Emig said. “I was there with about 50 other people. We had a good time, which made [news of the crash] a real shocker this morning.”

Emig said Benson commuted through Fullerton daily, either by flying or driving, and had obtained his pilot’s license about 18 months ago. Usually, he dropped off Arehart at Fullerton and then flew to Hawthorne Airport. From there, he would drive to a foundry he owned in Gardena, said Jan Ehrenberg, office manager of Aero Haven, a charter service at Big Bear Airport.

“He was a good pilot, as far as I could tell,” Emig said.

Arehart was a flight instructor, Emig said.

Monday’s crash reopened a longstanding debate over safety at the airport, which borders Buena Park. In the past 10 years, 24 planes have crashed and nine people have been killed, including Monday’s victims, at or near Fullerton Airport.

Rhonda McCune, the former mayor of Buena Park who has long advocated closing the airport, grieved for the accident victims. But she said she wasn’t surprised by the accident.

“It’s no secret that I’ve felt Fullerton Airport should be closed down. I haven’t changed my mind,” said McCune, who lives a mile from the field. “I felt these deaths today were inevitable. I’m surprised we haven’t had more accidents and death over the years.”

Hernandez is a Times staff writer, Boucher a correspondent. Staff writers David Haldane, Martin Miller, H. G. Reza and Rene Tawa contributed to this story