SAN DIEGO (AP) — A groundbreaking alternative music executive. A photographer. Two young women just starting their careers in the music industry.
They were among the six people killed Thursday when a private plane owned by Dave Shapiro, cofounder of the Sound Talent Group, as it approached a nearby airport whose lights were out in heavy fog. The fiery crash stunned the heavy metal and hard rock scene.
It could take a year to sort out exactly what happened to the Cessna 550 Citation, which hit power lines just before it crashed and killed the pilot and passengers. But investigators know there was thick fog, problems with the runway lights and a broken weather alert system, said Dan Baker of the National Transportation Safety Board.
Here’s what to know about the six people on board the private flight:
Dave Shapiro
It was the connections made more than the music he played that made him successful.
The music agency that Shapiro cofounded, Sound Talent Group, represented groups like Parkway Drive and Sum 41, but it also ventured into more pop acts like Vanessa Carlton.
He got into the music industry playing in the band — Count with Stars — that he founded with friends while in high school.
Shapiro helped bring the underground $10-a-show alternative scene in the 2010s to the mainstream. But he also was huge in creating a community, said Mike Shea, founder of Alternative Press Magazine.
“In this music industry, there are just too many people ripping people off and using people,” he said. “Dave was not like that.”
Shapiro was listed as the plane’s owner and had a pilot’s license. Officials have not said who was flying the plane.
Kendall Fortner and Emma Huke
Both Fortner, 24, and Huke, 25, joined Shapiro’s agency as booking associates after graduating from college, according to their bios released by Sound Talent Group, which confirmed both women were on the plane.
Fortner “was hooked on music” from a young age thanks to her father, who took her to concerts, and she showed an interest in working in the music industry as a teenager.
Huke, too, knew from a young age that she wanted to work in the industry.
“There was nothing Emma loved more than live music,” the agency said, and she worked hard to save up money to attend concerts and festivals.
The agency said both Fortner and Huke were good at their jobs, which included planning tours.
Daniel Williams
Williams was a former drummer for the popular Ohio metalcore band The Devil Wears Prada, celebrated for their ability to marry melodic punk rock with metallic detours.
When Williams “was in the band, that’s when they broke out,” Shea said.
Thomas Gutches, who manages rock bands and artists, recalled Williams’ ability to captivate audiences at shows with his drumming as much as a band’s frontman does.
“Daniel was putting on a show from his style of playing,” he said.
Williams’ band, which had two releases reach the Top 10 of the Billboard 200, was a client of Sound Talent Group.
Celina Marie Rose Kenyon
Kenyon, 36, was another passenger on the flight, according to the coroner’s office in San Diego. A spokesperson for Sound Talent Group said she wasn’t an employee.
Bryan Charles Feldman, Kenyon’s father, said in a statement to The Associated Press that his daughter was respected in her career as a professional photographer and deeply loved by friends and family, including her daughter and her partner.
Kenyon had been traveling “to photograph and support” some longtime friends, Feldman said, and decided to fly home to San Diego “with other crew and friends on a late night private flight rather than a commercial flight so she could get home early to take her daughter to school.”
“The world has lost a beautiful bright light,” Feldman said.
Dominic Christopher Damian
Also killed was 41-year-old Damian, the coroner’s office announced Saturday.
A martial arts school in San Diego, The Training Center, said via Instagram that Damian trained there. The gym is hosting an open mat session in his memory on Monday.
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