Photos: Small Plane Makes Fiery Landing Into San Diego Target Parking Lot

A small plane crashed into a parking lot shared by Costco and Target yesterday in San Diego, severely injuring its 52-year-old female pilot and killing an 80-year-old female passenger.The single-engine Mooney M20 had departed from Riverside around 4:30 p.m. and was headed to the Montgomery Field Airport, NBC San Diego reports.

At 5:30 p.m., the plane clipped a light fixture near the Target as well as the top of the Target itself, then crash landed into a loading dock area where it caught on fire. Several people with fire extinguishers rushed to put out the blaze before it reached the fuel tank and to pull the women from the plane.

A helicopter pilot, Vince Carter, who was taking off from Montgomery Field said he heard the pilot issue a distress call to the control tower saying that she had lost power and was going down. He told KNSD that being able to take the plane down into the empty loading dock was a "testament to her skill as a pilot."

The passenger suffered from serious burns and died later at the hospital. The pilot is critically injured, but is expected to pull through. Two rescuers were treated for minor injuries.