Pilot and His Mother Die in Crash

Search-and-rescue workers found the bodies of a Norco pilot and his mother in the wreckage of a small plane in Chino Hills State Park early Monday, hours after they were reported missing after taking off from a Long Beach airport.

The pilot, David Kula, 61, was president of the Corona Pilots Assn. and had planned a mercy flight to Arizona today to deliver Christmas presents to an orphanage.

Kula took off from Corona Municipal Airport late Sunday afternoon to pick up his 83-year-old mother, Ruth, who had been visiting her granddaughter in Long Beach.

On the return flight, the evening sky had grown cloudier, and Kula’s plane -- a single-engine, four-seat model built in 1973 -- smashed into a hill in a remote area of the 13,000-acre park east of a 1,750-foot ridge and just three miles from the Corona airport.

Kula’s wife grew alarmed when they did not arrive as expected at 5:15 p.m.

“I knew he had a 20-minute flight back [from Long Beach Municipal Airport], and that it’d be another 20 minutes for him to cover his plane,” said Carol Kula, David’s wife of 10 years.

“When he wasn’t home in 40 minutes, I called his cell phone and got nothing, which scared me. So then I drove to the [Corona] airport and saw his car in the parking lot, but couldn’t find his plane.”

Carol Kula alerted the Civil Air Patrol and San Bernardino County sheriff’s search-and-rescue team of her husband’s absence, then went home to await word.

“Not knowing was the worst, even though I knew something terrible had happened,” she said.

Kula’s plane was found at 3:10 a.m., and Carol Kula said she learned of the crash watching television news about 6:45 a.m.

David Kula, a credit manager at a Corona business, is survived by five children and 17 grandchildren.

Ruth Kula, who lived in Detroit, was described as healthy and feisty. She was scheduled to board a flight home today from Ontario International Airport.

At the Corona airport, solemn fellow pilots called Kula a generous man, and said he was planning to fly his plane to Yuma, Ariz., today to deliver Christmas gifts -- stuffed bears, dolls, toy cars and clothing -- to a missionary caring for orphans.

Richard Robles, a pilot who helped organize the scheduled Wings of Faith trip, said he accompanied Kula two weeks ago on a similar flight.

“Coming back, [Kula] told me how satisfying it was to be doing good with his skills and his plane,” Robles said.

Some pilots at the airport expressed concern that Kula was not trained to handle the rainy, dark conditions he met on his return flight to Corona.

Spokesmen from the Federal Aviation Administration and National Transportation Safety Board said Monday that the crash is under investigation and that no cause had been determined.