4 Die In Mid-Air Crash
A Norwood-based plane owned by Richard Jackson, 29, of 28 Conant Road, Brookline, figured in the air tragedy Saturday at Hyannis.
The plane, a Tri-Pacer which Jackson purchased from Wiggins Airways, landed safely despite a damaged wing at Hyannis Airport after a mid-air collision with a sight-seeing plane which crashed and burned, causing deaths of four.
Barton M. Heefner, aviation safety agent attached to the Norwood CAA office, is in charge of the investigation of the mishap In which three members of one family and their pilot plunged to their deaths in a backyard.
Killed: Mrs. Alta Williams, 49, of 187 Prospect St., Clinton, a widow and a school teacher in Bolton; her 13-year-old daughter, Lois; her brother-in-law, Russell M- Williams, 51, of 11 Sibley St. Auburn, custodian of the Bryn Alawr Elementary School in Auburn, and Phllip Pendleton, 22, of Main Street, Barnstable, the pilot.
Witnesses said both ships were approaching the airport for a landing when they came together, about one-fourth mile from the runway.
The sight-seeing plane went into a spin and hurtled down nearly 1,000 feet, toward a thickly-settled residential area. It glanced off the roof of a two-story house at 85 Cedar Street, and landed in the backyard, where its engine burst into flames.
A witness, Robert H. Laber of Walpole, an aeronautical engineer, said he watched the Cessna piloted by Pendelton and Jackson’s Piper Tri-Pacer as they approached the airport.
“The Tri-Pacer was coming in on a short approach,” he said. “The Cessna was making a long approach, like a commercial plane. The Tri-Pacer “passed under the Cessna and they touched.”
The wrecked plane was owned by Flying. Inc., a Cape Cod flight school and sight-seeing service operated by state Rep. Allan F. Jones of Barnstable.
Its pilot, Pendleton, was single, he held a commercial license and was a part-time pilot.
(All articles originally published in the Norwood Messenger)