Olayiwola Matthew
Six people have been reported dead following the crash of a small aircraft into the Pacific Ocean near the San Diego, California coastline on Sunday afternoon.
The aircraft, a Cessna 414, went down around 12:45 p.m., approximately three miles west of Point Loma, shortly after departing from San Diego International Airport.
The flight was en route to Phoenix, Arizona.
Rescue efforts were quickly initiated by the U.S. Coast Guard, which dispatched both aircraft and boats to the crash location.
San Diego lifeguards and officials from the U.S. Border Patrol also joined the coordinated search.
“Initial debris recovered by lifeguards have been turned over to Coast Guard authorities,” San Diego Fire and Rescue said in a statement.
The National Transportation Safety Board has launched an investigation into the cause of the crash.
Eyewitness Tyson Wislofsky shared his account of the plane’s descent with NBC 7: “I saw it come down at an angle. It wasn’t flying straight to the ground,” he said. “The next time it came out of the clouds, he went straight into the water. But after I saw this splash, about six seconds later, it was dead silent. I knew that they went in the water, nose first, at a high speed.”
The Cessna is registered to Optimal Health Systems, a vitamin and supplement company headquartered in Pima, Arizona.
It remains unclear whether any employees of the company were aboard the plane at the time of the crash.
The company is owned by Douglas Grant and his wife Hilary Kit.
Attempts by the Daily Mail to reach them by phone on Monday morning were unsuccessful.
-Daily Mail