Plane Skids Off Runway, Crashes in N.J.
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: February 2, 2005
Filed at 9:56 a.m. ET
TETERBORO, N.J. (AP) -- A corporate jet sped off the end of a runway while attempting to take off from Teterboro Airport on Wednesday, hurtling across a highway during the morning rush hour and slamming into a warehouse. At least 11 people were injured and two were missing.
One witness said the pilot crawled out of the wreckage and said the crew lost control of the plane.
State police said two people were missing and 11 were injured in the crash. It was not immediately clear whether all those people were on the plane. The plane appeared to have struck at least one car.
It was headed for Midway Airport in Chicago, said Greg Martin, a spokesman for the Federal Aviation Administration in Washington. Another FAA spokesman, Jim Peters, said the jet was carrying 12 passengers and two crew members.
One witness said the plane never made it off the ground after ``sliding and skidding'' down the runway.
``Usually we see them lift off, but this one just went straight and started scratching the ground. There were sparks shooting out all over the place,'' said Joseph Massaro, a psychologist who lives nearby.
Video from television station helicopters showed wheel tracks, plainly visible in snow, that ran straight off the end of the runway, through a fence and a snow bank and then across six-lane U.S. 46.
Witness Robert Sosa told WNBC-TV he saw the plane crash into the building.
``Two guys came off with their hand cuts,'' Sosa said. ``The pilot said he dragged himself out. He literally crawled out like a baby, and all the other people just walked out normal.''
``He said as they tried to airborne before five minutes past (7 a.m.), they just lost control and they couldn't airborne the plane. They went straight through, 100 miles per hour,'' Sosa said.
Martin said communication between the air traffic control and the aircraft was routine and the aircraft had been cleared for takeoff.
Martin identified the aircraft as a twin-engine Canadair Challenger 600, ``a type of small regional business/charter jet'' that can carry 12 to 15 passengers.
The building that was struck was described as a clothing warehouse, and there were no injuries there, Martin said.
State Police Trooper Stephen Jones said emergency management crews at the warehouse were conducting ``a rescue operation.''
``You act on that assumption until you know otherwise,'' he said.
Brenda Leahy, a spokeswoman at Hackensack University Medical Center, said five people, including the plane's co-pilot, were taken there. She did not know their conditions.
Two people, a flight attendant and a man who had been in a car, were taken to Holy Name Hospital in Teaneck, said hospital spokeswoman Katherine Kakogiannis. The flight attendant had minor injuries and she didn't know the condition of the other person.
The manager of the warehouse, owned by clothing company Strawberry, said he ran inside after the crash and helped firefighters make their way to the plane.
``You couldn't see anything inside. There was so much smoke it looked like fog,'' said Tommy Ficarra.
The FAA Web site says plane was registered to a company called 448 Alliance LLC, and gave an address in Dallas. Directory assistance has no company with that name, but does show a DDH Aviation at the same address. No one answered the phone there.
Nearly a year ago, on Feb. 26, a Gulfstream 3 registered to 448 Alliance rolled off a runway into the mud at Atlanta's Peachtree-DeKalb Airport after a snowstorm. No one was injured.
The airport, in the northern New Jersey suburbs 12 miles from midtown Manhattan, was closed after the crash.
Once used by weekend recreational fliers, Teterboro has grown into one of the nation's busiest small airports, catering to corporate jets looking to avoid the hassles of larger airports.
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/nati...ane-Crash.html