rom Boston.com – this is just so sad. Here this pilot was trying to do a wonderful thing by transporting this cancer patient and look what happened. Their plane crashed. This just gave me goosebumps. Thought s and prayers are with everyone involved. 
(George Rizer/Globe Staff)
By David Abel, Tania deLuzuriaga, Andrew Ryan, Globe Staff, and John M. Guilfoil and Anne Baker, Globe Correspondents
EASTON — A cancer patient was among three people killed this morning when a single-engine airplane operated by Angel Flight New England crashed on its way from an airport in Westhampton, N.Y., to Logan International Airport, officials at the nonprofit group said.
The crash at 10:25 a.m. left a male patient, his wife, and the pilot dead. The patient was being taken to Dana-Farber Cancer Institute for cancer treatment, said Amy Camerlin, a spokeswoman for Angel Flights, an organization of volunteer pilots that helps needy patients get medical care.
“Sadly, we learned the Angel flight patient and his wife and the pilot were lost,” Camerlin said in a phone interview. “They were traveling to Boston for medical treatment. Our deepest sympathy goes out to the patient’s and pilot’s families.”
Jim Peters, a spokesman for the Federal Aviation Administration, confirmed that the pilot was flying a Long Island couple to Boston for medical treatment. The plane crashed in the back row of a blacktop parking lot of a Hannaford’s supermarket on Robert Drive, which is also called Route 106. No one was injured on the ground.
“As to what happened, what may have transpired, we don’t know at this time,” said Richard Bunker, an inspector for the Massachusetts Aeronautics Commission, who rushed to the scene.
The registered owner of the four-passenger Beechcraft Bonanza plane is Janet Keene, who was reached by telephone today at her home in Brookfield, Conn. Keene said she inherited the plane and that the pilot was a man from Brookfield who had used the aircraft to fly more than a dozen mercy missions.
“We don’t know of any problems the plane had,” said Keene, who declined to identify the pilot by name. “This is really a tragedy.”
Easton Fire Chief Thomas Stone said that a last-minute maneuver by the pilot may have avoided casualties in the shopping complex, where the burned wings stretched across three parking spaces.
“One hundred feet in either direction and he could have hit some cars,” Stone said.
Easton Deputy Police Chief Allen Krajick said that he saw the plane flying low under the clouds when it appeared to “stall or spin.” Other witnesses have told investigators that the aircraft appeared to be having trouble staying aloft before it nose-dived into the parking lot of the shopping complex, which also includes a Target and a TJ Maxx.
“We’re very fortunate no one else was hurt,” Krajick said.
Bridget Dumoulin, 40, was shopping in Hannaford’s for pizza-making ingredients for her son’s dinner when, “there was a big explosion and the building shook.”
“At first I thought he hit the building,” Dumoulin said. “People rushed over and tried to help, but it was just too late. The flames were too intense.”
At the nearby Bank of Easton, branch manager Patti Desgrosseilliers heard a loud “boom” and looked outside to see the fire some 500 feet from her window.
“We ran outside, we saw the flames and the smoke, and we could just see the tail of the plane,” Desgrosseilliers said.
