Surveillance video captured the moment a thief brazenly escaped with a beloved vintage airplane in Torrance.
The plane’s owner, Anis Pradhan, is devastated after dedicating years to restoring the beloved airplane. The aircraft was not only a passion of Pradhan’s but was meant to be used for training underprivileged children who aspired to be pilots.
The plane was stored inside a custom Airstream trailer at a Torrance warehouse parking lot on the 22800 block of Lockness Avenue near Sepulveda Boulevard.
On Jan. 3, security footage captured the moment the suspect pulled up, hitched the trailer to their white pickup truck and hauled it away.
“I’m pretty devastated,” Pradhan said. “They broke a lock pad on the gate, opened the gate and they came in and just pulled it out of there.”
Pradhan said he had been meticulously rebuilding the 1940s-era plane over the past decade.
“I’ve spent so many hours, thousands of hours, putting this aircraft together and in a matter of minutes, it just disappeared,” Pradhan said. “The plane is a Piper PA-15/17. It’s a two-seater, U.S.-made aircraft.”
The plane measures 22 feet in length, 35 feet in width and weighs over 1,000 pounds. It has wings that could fold up, allowing it to be stored in the custom-built Airstream trailer that it was stolen in.
Pradhan is a flight instructor and his latest mission was focused on training young aspiring pilots from his home country of Nepal.
“This aircraft was going to Nepal,” Pradhan explained. “I work with this nonprofit organization called the National Innovation Center in Nepal and we were going to use it to teach underprivileged kids and whoever wanted to learn about aviation in that part of the world.”
For now, Pradhan’s dream of helping those aspiring pilots remains grounded until he can get his plane back. He’s hoping someone will recognize the large, oversized silver Airstream trailer with back barn doors and track down the thief who stole it.
The stolen airplane’s tail number is N4549H.
Anyone who may have spotted the plane or has information on this case is asked to call LAPD’s Harbor Division at 310-726-7700.