Family bound for Maine dies in plane crash

BUCYRUS, Ohio – A family of four from Texas was killed in a single-engine plane crash near a residential neighborhood Sunday night while they were flying to Maine, the State Highway Patrol said Monday.

A man, a woman and two children died when the plane went down in a field about 60 miles north of Columbus, Lt. Tony Bradshaw said.

No injuries were reported on the ground.

Authorities identified those killed as Paul Martin, 49, Lillian Martin, 45, and their children, Kitanna Martin, 10, and Shawn Martin, 11, all of Austin.

The family had been visiting relatives in Oklahoma and was flying to Searsmont, Maine, where they planned to spend the holidays at their farmhouse. All four were killed on impact.

“There’s no indication they had any connection to Bucyrus or that they were landing or taking off from the Bucyrus airport,” Lt. Chris Zurcher said.

Light rain and overcast skies were reported in the area when the crash occurred about 7:10 p.m., according to the National Weather Service in Cleveland.

After the plane hit the ground, debris struck a nearby apartment complex, Bradshaw said. Damage to the apartment building was minor, he said.

The Martin family was well-known in Searsmont and once hosted the town’s Heritage Days celebration after taking down and rebuilding a historic barn on their property, Town Clerk Kathy Hoey said.

Paul Martin was the founder of a marketing research firm in Austin.

A family friend said Martin was an experienced pilot who frequently flew the family to their summer home in Maine and other spots around the country and in Mexico.

“He’d been flying for years and years,” said Caryn Macdonald, a longtime friend whose husband worked as the senior analyst at Martin’s company, TFCinfo.

Lillian Martin was a stay-at-home mom who was thinking about returning to marine archaeology, Macdonald said. She wrote “The Art and Archaeology of Venetian Ships and Boats.”

The family spent the summer in Crete so Lillian Martin could help excavate an ancient shipwreck. While she worked, Paul Martin taught the children how to scuba dive and helped Kitanna work on a science fair project about ancient pottery.

“Whatever they did, the whole family did it with a whole heart,” Macdonald said. “They were just a very active and lively family.”

The Martins’ annual Christmas newsletter – sent just before they left Texas last week – featured photos of the summer trip, of Shawn’s prize-winning science fair project and of Paul Martin working on a friend’s lobster boat off the coast of Maine.