SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 17 (Xinhua) -- A small plane crashed on Wednesday morning in a residential neighborhood in East Palo Alto in the U.S. state of California, killing three people on board, local media reported.

A house was damaged in the crash and the plane also destroyed three cars, but there were no reports of injuries on the ground, the San Francisco Chronicle newspaper said in a report on its website.

The plane was a twin-engine Cessna 310 that had taken off from Palo Alto Airport and was bound for Hawthorne Municipal Airport in Los Angeles County, Ian Gregor, a spokesman for the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration, was quoted as saying.

The cause of the crash was not immediately known, but there were reports that the plane hit an electrical tower or wires on takeoff, causing power outages in the area.