1 Pilot Killed, 1 Hurt in Midair Crash

Two single-engine planes collided in the skies over a residential neighborhood near San Diego on Tuesday, killing the pilot of one of the planes, which crashed into a house below.

The other plane in the 11:35 a.m. crash, piloted by a student flying with an instructor, was able to land on a nearby street in the Fletcher Hills Highlands neighborhood of El Cajon.

The student pilot was taken to a local hospital, while the flight instructor suffered only minor injuries, El Cajon police Lt. Dick Nasif said.

Nasif said the planes hit each other as both were approaching nearby Gillespie Field. The student pilot had been practicing takeoff and landing drills, Nasif said.

The collision broke apart one of the planes, a Cessna 176, littering the neighborhood with pieces. The plane’s engine crashed through the shake roof and landed in the kitchen of a house. The fuselage containing the pilot hit the edge of the roof, ripped its rain gutters and fell into the backyard, where it rested at an angle against the house.

The pilot of the plane, Mark Francis, 25, of the United Kingdom, was dead at the scene, police said. Francis was identified by the San Diego County medical examiner’s office as a squad leader in the Royal Air Force who was in the United States for training. He is survived by his parents, also of the United Kingdom.

The plane’s tail landed two blocks away.

The house was empty at the time of the crash, and no one on the ground was hurt.

Several residents witnessed the crash. Shirly Boyle, who lives on the street where the plane’s tail landed, said the impact “sounded like a trash truck crashing. The debris was falling from the sky; there was quite a bit of small pieces falling down.”

Hugh Barnhill was working in his yard when the planes hit. “I heard that sound, it was a big loud sound. I looked up, and I had to run because [the tail] was falling right toward me. I’ve got pieces in my pool.”

The student-piloted Cessna 156 landed on Fanita Road, about a quarter-mile from the crash site. The plane hit a lamppost and ran into a fence at a highway construction site on the busy street near Grossmont College.

The instructor, Daniella Bocker, walked away from the crash with cuts and bruises. Her student, Robert Blanken, 33, was taken to Sharp Memorial Hospital. Hospital officials said Blanken had no apparent injuries but was being held overnight for observation.

The deceased pilot’s plane was leased from the Anglo American Aviation company, based at Gillespie Field.

The instructional plane is owned by the Golden State Flying School, also based at Gillespie Field.

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Times staff writer Peter Y. Hong and Associated Press contributed to this story.