ST. PAUL — A 53-year-old Minnesota man crashed his private plane and died on California's Catalina Island on Thursday after sending a radio message that he feared he was having a heart attack.
Jeffrey Loeffler of Wyoming, Minn., reportedly radioed to a traffic advisory frequency that he couldn't move the right side of his body and was having severe chest pains. Sgt. Fred Keelin of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's station on Catalina said that Loeffler said he might not make the runway.
Keelin said Sunday that Keelin crashed minutes later. No one else was on board. The crash ignited a 25-acre brush fire on the island that firefighters spent the day battling.
