A man aboard a single-engine plane that crashed in a nursery near Brackett Field Airport in La Verne on Sunday reported engine trouble less than a minute before the plane went down.
“I need to do a 180. I’m having an engine problem,” he said during a call to the airport’s control tower.
The controller told the man to maintain altitude and go around, which he confirmed. Roughly a minute later, at about 5:50 p.m., the Cessna 177RG crashed into a nursery west of the airport’s runway. Video footage from the scene shows the mangled plane on a gravel path between rows of plants.
Authorities said two people were inside the plane when it crashed. A man died at the scene, and a woman was taken to a hospital in serious condition, La Verne police Lt. Chris Dransfeldt said.
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