Pilot ID’d in plane BART yard crash

HAYWARD — A Bay Area resident was the registered owner and pilot of a plane that crashed into a BART train yard Sunday afternoon, authorities said.

According to a Federal Aviation Administration registry inquiry, the Piper PA-23-150 fixed-wing multiple-engine plane that went down was registered to Robert Pursel Jr. of Wailuku, Hawaii, on Maui. An FAA pilot registry database lists a Fremont address for Pursel.

A man with the same name is listed in the LinkedIn social network as a director of investor relations at MagnaChip Semiconductor, a Korean-based manufacturer of semiconductors for technology products and platforms that has an office in San Jose.

Pursel, who has worked in technology since the mid1990s, was a former director of investor relations for San Jose-based Atmel Corp., and handled investor relations and business analysis for Milpitas-based LSI Logic.

He was a former U.S. Navy lieutenant, a UC Berkeley and Santa Clara University graduate, and an FAA-certified transport pilot and flight instructor.

The plane’s pilot had departed from Hayward Executive Airport, about 4 miles from the crash site, and planned to return there, FAA spokesman Ian Gregor said. The FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board are investigating.

NTSB officials said an investigator with the agency went to the crash scene on Sunday and returned Monday. The investigators did an initial report of the accident site and interviewed one witness. The cause of the crash remains under investigation.

A small fire broke out when the plane crashed, prompting a response from the Alameda County and Hayward fire departments. BART service was shut down between the South Hayward and Fremont stations for more than two hours, according to BART officials.