Round Lake Park pilot who died in plane crash was a Navy Reserve veteran
Long retired from his job as an automotive technician, Paul Sanfilippo spent much of his later years in the sky as a pilot.
And even if he wasn’t flying one of the two aircraft he owned, the Round Lake Park man was at the Waukegan Regional Airport every day, recalled one of his nephews, John Canella.
“He loved flying,” said Canella, of Antioch.
Sanfilippo, 82, was one of two men killed Thursday when a Beechcraft S35 Bonanza crashed near a Crystal Lake intersection, east of the Lake in the Hills Airport. Lake Forest resident Hugh Scott Clark also died.
Sanfilippo owned the plane that went down.
Sanfilippo learned to fly in the 1950s, both on his own and with the U.S. Navy Reserves, Canella said. Stationed out of the former Glenview Naval Air Station, Sanfilippo was a flight engineer on Lockheed P-3 Orions, legendary anti-submarine aircraft.
Sanfilippo retired about 20 years ago. He never married or had children.
A qualified flight instructor, Sanfilippo taught Canella to fly. But the younger man said he didn’t keep up with the hobby.
He called his uncle “a very cautious pilot.”
Sanfilippo was encumbered by several health issues later in life, but “he kept fighting,” Canella said.
In addition to flying, Sanfilippo enjoyed fishing, especially on the shore of Lake Michigan in Waukegan or Kenosha and in the ponds of the Saddlebrook Farms subdivision where he lived.
Visitation is scheduled for 4 to 8 p.m. Tuesday at the Strang Funeral Chapel, 410 E. Belvidere Road, Grayslake.
A funeral is planned for 10 a.m. Wednesday at Strang.
Interment will follow at St. Joseph Cemetery in suburban River Grove.
Instead of flowers, donations can be sent to the American Cancer Society, 100 Tri-State International, Lincolnshire, Ill., 60069.