James Horner’s Death Confirmed, Ruled Accidental By Coroner

Oscar-winning composer James Horner, whose work included the soundtrack for the movie Titanic, was the pilot killed in a plane crash this week, and the death has been ruled an accident, according to a California coroner.

Ventura County Deputy Medical Examiner Zeb Dunn says Horner’s identity was confirmed Thursday (June 25). He says the cause of death is blunt force trauma, and although the plane burned after it crashed, Horner was already dead from the impact. Blunt force trauma is the usual cause of death for persons who die as a result of an airplane crash.

The confirmation was no surprise to anyone as authorities had stated they were “very certain” it was James Horner who had piloted and crashed in the plane. However, it was not possible to issue a death certificate until he was properly and completely identified.

Horner died Monday when his plane crashed and burned in a remote area of the Los Padres National Forest, about 100 miles northwest of Los Angeles, an area that he had been known to travel before. Airplane fuelers confirmed that they had fueled his airplane not long before the crash was reported on Monday. His agents said that his death was certain on Tuesday even though no positive identification has been made.

Generally, dental records are used in these circumstances to identify those who have been incinerated in such instances as a plane crash.

Horner, aged 61 at the time of his death, was a gifted composer who wrote music for not only Titanic, but the immensely popular Avatar as well as Braveheart. He was nominated for 10 Oscar awards and won two of them. Many musicians and actors have stated he was a role model and an inspiration.

It may not be known for many weeks, if ever, what caused his plane to crash. The weather in the area was reported to be calm on Monday.

In earlier interviews, Horner discussed how he was able to analyze the emotions in his head before he composed such breathtaking soundtracks, according to NPR.

“The first thing that I try and find is the emotional content of the film and the tone of the film, and what instruments, what sounds, are going to paint for me the emotions that I feel. Writing a melody in its simplest terms takes two seconds. The hard part is weaving a carpet that lasts exactly a certain amount of time, and in that time, I have to acknowledge maybe 36, 38 events – gunfire, people dying, a monster dying – whatever the things are, it relies on exact timings to the hundredth of a second so that the music matches the picture.”

[Photo by Wired]