CLARENCE, N.Y. (AP) _ A commuter plane coming in for a landing nose-dived into a house in suburban Buffalo, sparking a fiery explosion and killing all 48 people on board and one person in the home. It was the first fatal crash of a commercial airliner in the U.S. in 2 1/2 years.
Witnesses heard the twin turboprop aircraft sputtering before it went down in light snow and fog around 10:20 p.m. Thursday about five miles from Buffalo Niagara International Airport.
Continental Connection Flight 3407 from Newark, N.J., came in squarely through the roof of the house, its tail section visible through the blazing rubble.
“The whole sky was lit up orange,” said Bob Dworak, who lives less than a mile from the crash site. “All the sudden, there was a big bang, and the house shook.”
One person in the home was killed, and two others inside escaped with minor injuries. Among the 44 passengers killed was a woman hose husband died in the World Trade Center attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. A fellow 9/11 activist said Beverly Eckert was heading to Buffalo for a celebration of what would have been her husband’s 58th birthday.
By morning light, with the rubble still smoking, the task of retrieving remains had not yet begun.
The plane “basically dove right into the top of the house,” said Clarence emergency control director, calling it “clearly a direct hit.”
“It’s remarkable that it only took one house,” Bissonette said. “As devastating as it was, it could’ve easily wiped out that entire neighborhood on a strafing run type of thing.”
No mayday call came from the pilot before the crash, according to a recording of air traffic control’s radio messages captured by the Web site LiveATC.net.
Neither the controller nor the pilot showed concern that anything was out of the ordinary as the airplane was asked to fly at 2,300 feet.
The 74-seat Q400 Bombardier aircraft, operated by Colgan Air, was flying from Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey.
Colgan Air is the same company that flies the Continental Connection flights in and out of Easterwood Airport in College Station.