HONOLULU (AP) — The parents of two Oklahoma brothers who were among five people killed in a Hawaii plane crash are suing the skydiving company that owned the single-engine aircraft.
Marshall and Phillip Cabe were about to go skydiving in May when the Cessna crashed and burned soon after taking off from a Kauai airport.
“This lawsuit is going to hopefully find out why engine failed,” said Honolulu attorney Rick Fried, who filed the lawsuit Monday in state court.
D&J Adventures Inc. owner David Timko declined to comment.
Pilot Damien Horan and skydiving instructors Enzo Amitrano and Wayne Rose also died in the crash.
Witnesses told National Transportation Safety Board investigators the plane was 150 feet in the air when it made a sudden right turn, descended and hit the ground.
The brothers’ father, Michael Cabe, also witnessed the crash, Fried said.
“They had both graduated from college recently, and he was giving them as a present a joint skydiving trip,” Fried said, describing how the father, a general contractor on Kauai, ran to the burning wreckage, tried to pull them out and administer CPR.
Marshall Cabe, 25, was an athlete who played rugby, soccer and softball, Fried said. His brother Phillip Cabe, 27, was an artist who painted and played piano and guitar. He was in the Air National Guard and had deployed to the Middle East. The brothers graduated from Cameron University in Lawton, Oklahoma, in December.
“They were just out of college. They had their whole lives ahead of them,” Fried said. “The father witnessing this . you can’t imagine what he went through having seen that. It was just horrific.”