A Redding doctor who cared for patients from Mount Shasta to Red Bluff died over Labor Day weekend when his small airplane crashed into a hangar at a North Bay Area airport, causing the plane and the building to catch fire, according to first responders.
The loss of 75-year-old Jeffrey Buren Krahling of Redding on Saturday, Aug. 31, rocked medical communities from Siskiyou, Shasta and Tehama counties, friends said.
When Marin County Sheriff’s deputies and firefighters arrived at Gnoss Field Airport in Novato around 3:50 p.m. on Saturday, they found the aircraft and the hangar “entirely engulfed in flames.” At that time, first responders didn’t know if anyone was in the single-engine plane, according to the sheriff’s report .
Bystanders warned firefighters there were fuel tanks in adjacent hangars that could ignite if the fire spread, the sheriff said. Crews put out the fire, which had spread to surrounding vegetation .
First responders found Krahling’s body in the plane. He was the only person on board, according to the sheriff.