Fresno couple, daughter and 2 others die in fiery South Lake Tahoe plane crash
Updated Aug. 26 3:17pm:
Javier de la Mora has told KOLO-TV in Reno that his brother Francisco de la Mora was piloting the plane that crashed in South Lake Tahoe on Saturday night. The pilot is one of the registered owners of the plane.
The four others on board are believed to be de la Mora’s wife, daughter and two other people.
Updated Aug. 26 3:10pm:
Federal officials are waiting for family members of the deceased to be notified before releasing the names of the people who died in the Aug. 25 plane crash in South Lake Tahoe.
The fire that was ignited by the downed plane was about 1 acre in size.
Updated Aug. 26, 2012, 2:05pm:
Francisco J. De La Mora of Fresno and Shannon D. Fleck, hometown unknown, are the registered owners of the plane that crashed into a field off the runway of Lake Tahoe Airport on Saturday night, according to the FAA Registry.
The Piper that disintegrated on impact, killing all on board, was a fixed wing single-engine.
Federal officials are on scene at the site of the Aug. 25 plane crash in South Lake Tahoe. Photo/Claire Fortier
This same plane was involved in an accident on March 5, 2005, in Destin, Fla., according to the National Transportation Safety Board. In that accident the two people aboard were not injured.
NTSB records said the cause of that accident was, “The pilot’s inadequate compensation for wind during a crosswind takeoff resulting in a loss of directional control and subsequent collision with terrain.”
The plane did not get far off the runway before crashing Aug. 25. Photo/Claire Fortier
FAA and NTSB officials are in South Lake Tahoe investigating the Aug. 25 accident that is believed to have killed five people who had been in Tahoe for only a few hours. The plane seats seven.
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Updated Aug. 26, 2012, 9:10am:
By Kathryn Reed
FAA officials believe five people could have been on board the plane that crashed Saturday night on take-off from Lake Tahoe Airport.
The Piper Cherokee could seat six people.
The Federal Aviation Administration in Southern California would not give details about the victims, nor where they are from or what makes them believe there were five people on board.
In looking at the wreckage from Saturday night’s plane crash in South Lake Tahoe, officials the morning of Aug. 26 were not able to recover any identifiable markings.
“It’s just a charcoal circle,” City Manager Nancy Kerry told Lake Tahoe News.
Nor have there been any calls from the airport the plane originated from.
Mountain West Aviation officials, which runs the operations, told investigators that the plane landed Aug. 25 at the South Lake Tahoe airport for a few hours and that the occupants requested a taxi. The taxi took them to a local restaurant and returned them to the airfield.
The plane crashed about 9:45pm into a field on the north end of the runway.
FAA officials from Reno are to be at the site this morning.
National Transportation Safety Board officials will be coming from Idaho today or Monday.
Because the plane landed on El Dorado County property, the sheriff’s office is taking control locally. However, neither the local lieutenant nor the lieutenant in charge of media relations was available Sunday morning.
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By Kathryn Reed
A plane crashed after taking off from Lake Tahoe Airport on Saturday night. No one on board survived.
Because the plane was completely engulfed in flames and only the fuselage remained intact, rescue personnel do not know what type of plane was involved. And because no flight plan was filed, it is not known how many people were on board.
The South Lake Tahoe airport does not have a tower, so information about planes taking off and landing is not as complete as it is at other airports. There is a recording the pilot made, but it has limited information.
A fire started immediately after the plane crashed Aug. 25. Photo/Dan Wilvers
What officials could determine from what the pilot said is that the plane was not involved in the air show that took place at the airport earlier in the day. The plane also is not registered at Lake Tahoe Airport.
Because no part of the tail could be seen where the plane landed, it is not possible to match what is on the recording to what is on the ground.
South Lake Tahoe Police-Fire Chief Brian Uhler is the one who got closest to the plane, and as someone who owns a small plane, would know what to look for. It is hoped daylight will reveal a piece of the tail section.
Officials are saying it’s possible the plane was a four- or six-seater Lancer. The plane was registered to more than one person living outside the Lake Tahoe Basin. No fuel or other services were purchased locally.
“Witnesses report sputtering, that the engines didn’t sound good,” City Manager Nancy Kerry told Lake Tahoe News.
She said people saw the plane try to bank to the right. It’s not known if this was to try to return to the airport or avoid structures.
The aircraft crashed nose first into the dry brush north of the runway by Winnemucca Drive. No buildings were hit. On impact a brush fire of a few acres broke out that took firefighters about an hour to fully extinguish.
According to the National Weather Service in Reno, the wind at Lake Tahoe Airport at 9:45pm Aug. 25 was out of the south at 4 to 8mph.
Flying in and out of the mountains always poses risks, and more so in the summer because of the density of the air. A heavy plane can prevent a pilot from being able to gain enough altitude.
National Transportation Safety Board and Federal Aviation Administration personnel have been notified. It’s possible they will be on scene Sunday.
Overnight, local public safety personnel will secure the perimeter so no one can tamper with evidence. The body or bodies are likely to be recovered Sunday, with autopsies to follow.
Officials hope a flight plan was filed where the plane originated from so when it is overdue, that airport’s staff will call Lake Tahoe as another mechanism to confirm who was on the plane.
The last plane crash at Lake Tahoe Airport was Aug. 5, 2007, that killed the Bay Area pilot on impact when he took off on a summer morning heading south.
The crash is not expected to interfere with any airport operations on Sunday, including the Young Eagles flights that will be taking place. Capt. Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger, who landed an Airbus in the Hudson River, will be at the airport for the Young Eagles event.
This is very sad news to hear ,I was sitting out in the back yard,from 10;00 in the morning till 2;00 in the afternoon,and thought this is very different from last year show, Knowing I live right here by the airport the planes that I saw did not sound good at all,Kind of scary to know that you have to hear about a plane crashing,Kind of tells me it could of hit where I live, thats not good,Hopefully they get a tower up soon,Very scary,Lets make it a safe place to live,this is getting to close to my home,This a a sign that this needs to be corrected,RIP who or how many in that plane.
I thought the same thing too. ALl the planes sounded like they were having trouble, sounded like lawn mowers back firing. I had a weird feeling all day.
Tracey on Melba dr.
Doesn’t sound like antler would have helped in this case. May they all rest in peace!
A tower, not antler!
SO SAD,SO SAD WHAT HAPPENED,BUT GLAD IT DID NOT HIT THE HOSPITAL.
So very sad. I know what a few of you mean about how some of the planes sounded. I also had an uneasy feeling listening to them flying overhead.
I knew two of the people on board….very sad day for me and their families….I’ve lost a good friend..
3rd small plane crash here in 10 years. My heart goes out to their families.
The pilot n his wife n daughter were awesome people. They were my managers of where I lived for 5 years. I’m going to miss them greatly! This is a sad day! Rip del la Mora family!
Tragic indeed.
I learned to fly at the airport in SLT and have flown out of TVL a number of times. As long as you play by the rules, it’s a safe place to fly. That said, the thin air of 6,300′ is not as forgiving as that in lower altitudes. Obviously something went awry, but at a glance it seems like everything about the flight was positive (high power aircraft, reasonable passenger load, calm winds and lower density altitude at nighttime).
To those who mentioned the unusual engine sounds, I have a feeling the ‘unusualness’ came from the frequent gyrations of the stunt planes during their acrobatic routines. When a plane flies sideways, does a snap roll, or slides backwards during a show, the angle at which the propeller strikes passing air can change dramatically. That change in turn causes a change in the noise caused by the propeller. In addition, changes in the direction of the planes travel can cause variations in sound level due to the Doppler effect.
One other tidbit, planes which depart runway 36 (heading northbound, as this one did)follow noise abatement procedures, and make a left turn at the end of the runway to follow the marsh all the way to the lake. So, unless you live in the marsh, you stand a pretty low chance of having a plane drop in through your roof.
Josh
I grew up on Winnemucca Avenue not far from the end of the airport runway. My family still lives there. I remember several crashes in that meadow over the years, but none this deadly. It is frightning to think that my family’s home or Barton Memorial Hospital might have been impacted by that crash or burned in the resulting fire. It is too bad that there is no safer place to have built that airport. Our home along with many others were there before the airport was built. Visitors to the area are not always aware of the effect of the thinner air, a full tank of gas, and a full load of passengers. This is tragic. I am glad no one on the ground was involved.
I agree with you Su, I have oft thought that the Tahoe Basin and planes do not mix, perhaps for these stunt flyers who are so instinctually experienced they can instantly compensate for the thinner air. The airport also has to deal with a short runway and the winds are usually such that the only way to take off are toward the mountain. Remember the Killebrew plane, that was a result of not gaining the altitude needed. Plus, there is always the weather issue too, remember the airliner that crashed into the Kingsbury, that I believe you were supposed to be on?
elizabeth, please leave the opinions about flying into Tahoe to pilots. Mr. Killebrew’s aircraft collided with another aircraft, it had nothing to do with not gaining altitude, but the position of climbing aircraft with a nose-high attitude and the resultant visibility problem. I landed my aircraft at the airport on the same day that accident occurred and am very familiar with the accident investigation. The runway at KTVL is hardly short by any standard. Did you notice the C17 Globemaster land for the Airshow on Friday? That aircraft weighs 585,000 lbs when fully loaded and requires less than half the runway length of Lake Tahoe’s runway. We had commercial airline service for years with fully loaded airliners in and out. Aircraft climb into thin air every time they take off and most pilots are well versed in the effects of altitude. Weather is a problem and a consideration at every airport, everywhere. Again, please leave the uninformed comments out until the accident investigation is complete.
Hello again,
Pilot and non-pilot folks are more than welcome to participate in the conversation, but it might be best for those with less aviation-related knowledge to ask questions instead of making assumptions. That said, I’m happy to answer any questions to the best of my ability (but I certainly don’t know everything!).
In response to the comment about the runway length, it’s listed as 8,541 feet, which at a bit over 1.6 miles is pretty long. When I fly out of TVL, I’m usually off the ground and climbing in the first 1,200 feet of the runway, leaving me over a mile left in case something goes awry.
In regards to taking off towards the mountains, yep, it happens frequently. The 172 I fly in climbs at about 1/3 to 1/2 the rate of the aircraft that crashed, and I’m still here to type about it :) When I take off to the south (towards Echo Summit), I’ll generally circle over the golf course once or twice to gain altitude, then head off towards Sacramento.
While there are some folks who seem to ignore the natural rules which govern our ships ability to fly, for the most part pilots are a calculating and safe bunch. We value our lives quite a bit, and go to great lengths to keep our hearts a beatin’.
-J
I know how long ago this happened but this family was a regular at a resturant i work at in Fresno Ca, and i loved having them come in the little girl was so sweet and they always had a smile on their face. the whole family was amazing and is like family to us all there. We all just found out about it this morning the three boys that did not go on the trip came in and let us know. it breaks our hearts to hear about this and we are doing everything in our power to make sure these boys have everything they need. may these beautiful souls rest in peace.