Widow Recalls Husband, Pilot of Aspen Flight

Peter Kowalczyk’s wife said he loved her first. He loved flying second.

Kowalczyk was one of the pilots of a charter jet that crashed last week in Aspen, and his widow, Ewa, remembered him Thursday as a loyal and dependable husband whose eyes glowed proudly over his 5-year-old daughter, Anna. He died while following his dream of flying.

Parents and teachers at Simi Valley’s Katherine Elementary School joined in planning the memorial at St. Peter Claver Catholic Church to remember the life of the Polish immigrant. Anna is in kindergarten at the school.

Ewa, also a Polish immigrant, wrote about her husband in a statement that was read from the pulpit by the wife of a church deacon. Ewa recalled that Peter had moved from Poland nearly 15 years ago with the hope of fulfilling the American dream.

He met Ewa in Detroit, married her 10 years ago, studied aviation and eventually moved to Simi Valley, where the couple had lived for seven years.

They have no other family in this country. Ewa and Anna will return to Poland, she said in the statement, to show her daughter “their history, friendship and the love of family.”

About 100 people attended the memorial, many of them faculty at Katherine School or families of Anna’s kindergarten friends.

“They need the support, and we’re here out of a sense of wanting to help her,” said Samantha Brucato, who said her daughter was Anna’s best friend. Hayley, she said, had given Anna a bracelet at the service “so she’ll remember her.”

The crash that killed Kowalczyk, 38, left 17 others dead. He was the first officer of the Gulfstream III that took off from Burbank and hit a hillside beside the main highway leading into Aspen.

There was no evidence that the plane suffered structural or engine failure, but Aspen authorities had long ago warned that the runway was particularly dangerous.

National Transportation Safety Board investigators have not yet said whether Kowalczyk, or co-pilot Bob Frisbie, was flying the plane at the time of the crash.

For now, neighbors and others simply wanted to show they cared by being there for Kowalczyk’s widow and daughter.

“We’re a close community at the elementary school,” said Martha Lepore, a first-grade teacher. “And we always want to support it.”