WASHINGTON: A top Indian-origin neurologist and his doctor wife were killed when their single-engine aircraft which he was flying, crashed into a corn field in Ohio shortly after takeoff, US authorities said today.
The New Jersey-based Indian-American couple, Dr. Viswanathan Rajaraman, 54 and Dr. Mary J. Sundaram, 50, had arrived in Columbus on Friday after visiting their daughter, Kaavya Viswanathan, in Washington, D.C.
They had refueled their single-engine Cirrus CR22 plane at Rickenbacker Airport with plans to go home, Lt. Gary Lewis of the Ohio State Highway Patrol said.
Shortly after takeoff yesterday, the plane crashed in a cornfield south of the runways, killing the husband and wife, both physicians, The Columbus Dispatch reported.
Lewis identified the victims as Dr. Viswanathan Rajaraman, 54, the pilot, and Dr. Mary J. Sundaram, 50, of Franklin Lakes, New Jersey.
Rajaraman, who hailed from Tamil Nadu was a brain-cancer specialist and was also a licensed pilot.
Kaavya, 24, made headlines in 2006 because of rampant plagiarism allegations against her novel, “How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life.”
Doug Smith, a battalion chief with the Columbus Division of Fire, said firefighters from Rickenbacker were checking equipment and saw the plane go down shortly before 9 a.m. Crews were at the crash scene within two minutes, Smith said.
The plane caught fire, and little was left after the flames were extinguished, he said.
Firefighters from Madison and Hamilton townships also responded, as did troopers from the patrol and deputies with the Franklin County sheriff’s office. The crash was just north of the Franklin-Pickaway county line. The airport was closed from the time of the crash until about 10:30 a.m.
Lewis said the couple arrived in Columbus about 4:30 p.m. Friday after visiting their daughter, who recently graduated from Georgetown University law school in Washington, D.C. It was not known why they had stopped in Columbus.
The plane carried about 40 gallons of fuel when it took off yesterday.
Rajaraman had a valid pilot’s license, Lewis said.
Rajaraman was chief of neurooncology at the Cancer Center at Hackensack University Medical Center, the Columbus Dispatch reported.
He specialized in the treatment of brain cancer and was skilled in advanced surgical methods, including non-invasive treatment that uses radiation to destroy inoperable or recurrent brain tumors, according to a release from the hospital.
“He offered patients innovative surgical techniques and exceeded medical, social and emotional expectations,” Robert C. Garrett, chief executive of the hospital, said in the release.
Mary was trained as a gynecologist but reportedly stopped practicing to raise their daughter. She did not have a current license to practice, according to the New Jersey State Board of Medical Examiners website.
The couple’s only child Kaavya gained national attention in high school when she obtained a two-book, USD 500,000 publishing deal with Little, Brown and Co.
That contract was canceled after she was accused of plagiarism in her first book, How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life. The book was published while Viswanathan was an undergraduate at Harvard University. -PTI
