On Tuesday night, the pilot of a small plane sat on the runway of Catalina Island’s “airport in the sky” with four passengers on board and a decision to make. Take off into the looming darkness, relying primarily on the plane's instruments,

The Los Angeles County Medical Examiner on Thursday identified three of the five people killed in a small plane crash on Catalina Island.

As new reporting emerges that the pilot in the deadly Catalina plane crash, which killed five people, did not have clearance to take off, officials with the medical examiner’s office have formally identified four of the victims.

Five people lost their lives in a plane crash on California’s Catalina Islands after the aircraft took off without clearance from the airport. The twin-engine Beechcraft 95 crashed shortly after takeoff around 8 p.