Crime & Safety

Santa Cruz Family Perishes in Plane Crash; Probe May Take a Year

Investigators are still in the early stages and just trying to gather the basic bits of information.

The family that died in a solo plane crash in Watsonville on Thursday evening was from Santa Cruz, the Santa Cruz County Sheriff-Coroner's Office reported Friday afternoon.

David and DeDe Houghton, both 44, and their two children, Luke, 12 and Ryan, 10, died when their single-engine Mooney nosedived shortly after taking off from the Watsonville Municipal Airport.

The family was flying to Pine Mountain Lake, a two-hour trip in their small plane. Family members contacted authorities when the Houghtons didn't arrive as scheduled, police said.

Find out what's happening in Watsonvillewith free, real-time updates from Patch.

John Houghton, brother of David, has posted pictures and words about the family who died while taking off for a vacation at Pine Mountain Lake.

See it here.

Find out what's happening in Watsonvillewith free, real-time updates from Patch.

"Our thoughts and prayers go out to the Houghton family," Sheriff's Office Chief Don Bradley said.

David Houghton owned the plane with another man, Chester M. Belknap of Live Oak.

The bodies of one adult and one of the boys were found in the two front seats of the burned plane, according to National Traffic Safety Board regional investigator Michael Huhn, who is in charge of the crash probe. Huhn said he didn't know which person was flying the plane at the time of the accident.

The phone book lists an Evergreen Street address for the Houghtons.

David Houghton owned A+ Environmental Solutions, an environmental sciences and engineering company in Santa Cruz that specializes in soil and groundwater remediation and the abatement of asbestos and lead. He and DeDe founded the company in 1992, according to the A+ website.

Both David and DeDe were instructors at Aqua Safaris SCUBA Center on Soquel Avenue in Mid-County. Dede Houghton owns the company, according to the company website.

In her bio on the website, DeDe said she had dreamed of becoming a diver since she was a little girl.

She wrote: "today, thirty some-odd years after my dreams to dive began, I am the one diving with one son at my side, while my other son revels in popping our bubbles at the surface. I look forward to blowing bubbles with you!"

NTSB continues to probe the fatal accident. Friday afternoon, crews used a crane to load the charred wreckage onto a flatbed truck so it can be taken to a secure facility for further investigation.

With two adults and two middle school-aged boys aboard, the M20F Mooney was loaded to its full passenger capacity when it took off from Watsonville Municipal Airport Friday night.

Investigators are still at the early stages and just trying to gather the basic bits of information.

“The facts are pretty limited,” Huhn said. “I’m not going to speculate about what happened.”

Huhn won’t speculate because his task in the coming days is to begin gathering those facts and pulling them together to determine what happened to cause the crash. Piecing everything together is a comprehensive process that looks at several different areas.

“We look at the man, the machine, and the environment,” Huhn said.

That covers everything from pilot training, medical history, the plane’s mechanical integrity, to weather during the crash. Investigators dig deep enough to identity a cause or eliminate it from consideration.

According to Huhn, the initial on-site investigation determined all the plane’s four points were at the crash site: nose, tail and both wings. A single propeller blade is the only significant piece not yet located. That might indicate how the plane came down.

Marks at the crash scene indicate the plane struck the ground approximately 200 ft away from the medical office building. The striations in the parking lot asphalt also show the propeller contacted and sliced into the asphalt.

The time of day and location prevented a tragic event from being even worse. According to Cindy Weigelt, Watsonville Community Hospital public information officer, the Coastal Women’s Health Care office, where the plane struck, and the rest of the medical office building, were empty at the time of the crash.

“A bad situation could’ve been worse,” said Weigelt.

 The NTSB will release a preliminary report in five to 10 days.


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