Four Injured When Twin Impacts Homes

Investigators with the FAA and National Transportation Safety Board are combing through the wreckage of a Cessna 310Q that impacted two homes in Compton, CA Saturday afternoon.

KNBC-4 reports two persons onboard the aircraft (type shown above) and two others on the ground were critically injured when the plane came down in a neighborhood in the 500 block of West Cyprus Street. All four are expected to survive; a fifth person was hospitalized briefly, after reporting chest pains at the scene.

FAA spokesman Ian Gregor said the aircraft -- which was returning from Montgomery Field in San Diego to Hawthorne Airport -- attempted to make an emergency landing at Compton Airport for unspecified reasons prior to crashing. Photos show the aircraft came to rest in a nose-down attitude, with the nose crushed but the fuselage largely intact aft of the forward bulkhead.

The neighborhood where the plane came down lies west of the Compton airport; Gregor said the pilot may have been trying to reach Hawthorne, five nautical miles to the northwest.

The C-310Q is registered to a Carson City, NV business. The accident pilot belonged to a flying club based in Compton, according to the television station.

IDENTIFICATION
  Regis#: 6231Q        Make/Model: C310      Description: 310, T310 (U-3, L-27)
  Date: 04/12/2008     Time: 2250

  Event Type: Accident   Highest Injury: Serious     Mid Air: N    Missing: N
  Damage: Substantial

LOCATION
  City: COMPTON   State: CA   Country: US

DESCRIPTION
  AIRCRAFT CRASHED UNDER UNKNOWN CIRCUMSTANCES INTO A HOMES, FOUR PERSONS
  SUSTAINED SERIOUS INJURIES, TWO IN THE AIRCRAFT AND TWO ON THE GROUND,
  COMPTON, CA

INJURY DATA      Total Fatal:   0
                 # Crew:   2     Fat:   0     Ser:   2     Min:   0     Unk:   
                 # Pass:   0     Fat:   0     Ser:   0     Min:   0     Unk:   
                 # Grnd:         Fat:   0     Ser:   2     Min:   0     Unk:   

WEATHER: VFR

OTHER DATA
  Activity: Unknown      Phase: Unknown      Operation: OTHER

  FAA FSDO: LOS ANGELES, CA  (WP23)               Entry date: 04/14/2008

FMI: www.faa.gov, www.ntsb.gov