2 Killed, 2 Injured in Crash of Small Plane

Two people, one a young boy, were killed and two others seriously injured when their small plane crashed and burned Saturday in a Ventura County roadside agricultural ditch.

The crash occurred just before noon along Center Road near Walnut Avenue in unincorporated Ventura County, north of Camarillo, authorities said.

Eyewitnesses told firefighters and sheriff’s deputies that they saw the plane flying very low and at first mistook it for a crop-duster. When it slammed into the ground and burst into flames, bystanders rushed to the site to find that a boy and a man had been thrown from the aircraft.

Two people in the plane -- a woman and another boy -- did not survive, said Capt. Barry Parker of the Ventura County Fire Department.

Witnesses said the boy was waving for help as the man lay in the ditch, close to the plane. Bystanders pulled the two away from the wreckage, Parker said.

The identities of the four were withheld pending notification of relatives, but authorities indicated they were members of the same family. It was not immediately known where the single-engine four-seat plane had taken off from or where it was heading.

The survivors were taken to separate area hospitals, according to the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department.

The boy suffered from back pain and had difficulty breathing, and the man, believed to be the child’s father, had a broken back, broken ribs, an injured leg and facial trauma, Parker said.

Investigators for the National Transportation and Safety Board as well as the Federal Aviation Administration were expected at the crash site Saturday.