A small aircraft crashed into a high-rise building in New York City on Wednesday, killing at least two people and prompting US authorities to scramble fighter jets as a precaution, federal officials and media reported.
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg emphasised that the crash was not an act of terrorism but an accident. The accident claimed the life of New York Yankees American baseball player Cory Lidle, who was thought to be piloting the plane at the time.
Flames and a trail of smoke billowed from two floors of a building on the affluent upper east side of Manhattan before firefighters contained the blaze at about 3:30 pm (1930 GMT).
Witnesses said the crash caused a loud noise, and burning and falling debris was seen. Flames could be seen shooting from windows on two upper floors of The Belaire, a 50-story tower on East 72nd Street, close to the East River. Burning debris fell on the streets below as firefighters shot water streams of water at the flames from lower floors.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) confirmed a small plane hit the building at East 72nd street at about 2:45 pm (1845 GMT).
”They were flying by visual flight rules in that corridor and (the plane) was not in contact with a tower,” FAA spokesperson Diane Sticaliere said.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation also emphasised that there was no indication that the crash was related to terrorism.
The military scrambled fighter jets above US cities as a precaution, said Admiral Tim Keating, commander of the US Northern Command.
Keating would not say how many cities were under air cover but insisted there was no sign of terrorism in the accident.
”Fighters, along with early warning systems, they’ve been up there for half an hour, 45 minutes,” Keating told CNN.
The television images of the burning building evoked memories of the devastating attacks of September 11, 2001 on New York and Washington when hijacked airliners were flown into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, killing almost 3 000.
A woman who lives on the same street, Chris Foege, said, ”I just stood there in shock, I thought ‘this can’t be happening to us again.”
It was like ”9-11 all over again.”
A witness, Tamer Faltos, told CNN: ”We were just down the block at my work. And I just heard this huge, huge crash that makes me just shake.”
Emergency helicopters flew overhead as a crowd watched from the streets below. Police closed off traffic to at least a six-block area around the site amid a chaotic scene of police cars, ambulances and fire trucks.
”There was a boom sound, but we weren’t sure what it was, and then they told us to evacuate the bulidng,” said Lilian Regolia, who works opposite the building.
The building is a 50-storey condominium tower built in 1986 and located nearby Sotheby’s Auction House. It has 183 apartments, many of which sell for more than $1 million.
Both plane occupants killed
Bloomberg said a flight instructor and a student pilot, identified as Lidle, with 75 hours of experience were aboard and killed. The pair had circled the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor before heading uptown.
Both bodies were found on the street below, and the plane’s engine was found in one of the apartments, which had been turned into a four-alarm inferno, Bloomberg said.
According to a federal official, speaking to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity, the plane sent a distress call to the FAA before the crash. The craft was in the air for barely 10 minutes before the accident, taking off from a New Jersey airport at 2:29 p.m., with an emergency call reporting the fire coming in
13 minutes later.
Lidle’s passport was found on the street, according to the federal official.
On Sunday, the day after the Yankees were eliminated from the playoffs, Lidle cleaned out his locker at Yankee Stadium and talked about his interest in flying. He explained to reporters the process of getting a pilot’s license, and said he intended to fly back to California in several days and planned to make a few stops.
Lidle, 34, a nine-year major league veteran with a wife and a 6-year-old boy, came to the Yankees from the Philadelphia Phillies in a late-season trade. The journeyman pitched for seven teams through his career.
Firefighters injured
Eleven firefighters suffered minor injuries. Two people in an adjoining apartment miraculously escaped injury. Apartments in the E. 72nd Street luxury high-rise, called the Bellaire Condos, can sell for upward of $1-million (About R8-million).
Large crowds gathered at the crash scene, with many people in tears and others trying to reach loved ones by cellphone. Rain started pouring at the scene at around 4 p.m.
”I just saw something come across the sky and crash into that building,” said Young May Cha, 23, a medical student who was walking along 72nd Street. ”There was fire, debris … The explosion was very small.”
Cha said it appeared the plane was ”flying erratically” before it slammed into the building.
Richard Drutman, a professional photographer who lives on the building’s 11th floor, said he was speaking on the telephone when he felt the building shake.
”There was a huge explosion. I looked out my window, and saw what appeared to be pieces of wings, on fire, falling from the sky,” said Drutman, who quickly exited the building with his girlfriend.
The small private aircraft, with four seats, took off from New Jersey’s Teterboro Airport around 2:30 p.m. A federal aviation official, speaking on condition of anonymity because the investigation was continuing, said the plane was a Cirrus SR20 – an aircraft equipped with a parachute designed to let it float to
earth in case of a mishap.
Mystery writer Carol Higgins Clark, daughter of author Mary Higgins Clark, lives on the 38th floor of the building and was coming home in a cab when she saw the smoke.
”Thank goodness I wasn’t at my apartment writing at the time,” she said. She described the building’s residents as a mix of actors, doctors, laywers and writers, and people with second homes.
Fighter planes were scrambled over several cities across the country in the aftermath of the crash, despite the quick assurances that it was nothing more than an accident. ”We see this as a prudent measure at this time,” said Sgt. Claudette Hutchinson, a spokeswoman for the North American Aerospace Defense Command in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
– Sapa, AP, AFP, Guardian Unlimited, Reuters, Staff Reporter