Authorities Wednesday identified a 66-year-old co-pilot from San Bernardino County killed along with four other men in a midair collision between a light plane and a business jet over Otay Mesa.
James Hale of Adelanto was one of four occupants of a twin-engine Sabreliner that collided with a Cessna 172 while the aircraft were approaching Brown Field Municipal Airport shortly after 11 a.m. Sunday, according to the San Diego County Medical Examiner’s Office and the Federal Aviation Administration.
Hale was a contract employee for BAE Systems, which had leased the jet.
Also killed were three employees of the aerospace and defense company: John Kovach, 34; Carlos Palos, 40; and Jeff Percy, 41; all residents of the Kern County town of Mojave. They were taking part in a customer-training project at the time of the crash.
Percy was identified as a civilian pilot, but it was unclear if he was at the controls of the Sabreliner when it collided with the single-engine plane.
The fifth victim was the sole occupant of the Cessna, 55-year-old Michael Copeland of San Diego, a recreational flier and an executive with wireless-communications company Qualcomm.
The wreckage of the jet ended up west of Harvest Road. The Cessna went down in an open-space preserve east of state Route 125. The accident left aircraft wreckage strewn across a field near R.J. Donovan Correction Center and sparked several brush fires.
Investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board are working to determine the cause of the accident.
—City News Service
