A small airplane has crashed into a building in New York City. It hit a 50 story condo on 524 E. 72nd Street, and part of the building is on fire. There are no indications yet that this is anything other than an accident, the building is right on the East River, and so it is possible that it was hit by a small plane or helicopter that got lost:
Witness Sarah Steiner told CNN that fires were burning on the ground. “It looks like the plane just flew into someone’s living room there.” “It looks as if the aircraft didn’t go into the building but fell down,” she said. “It may be part of the debris burning on the ground.” Steiner said that when she arrived, she saw fire shooting out of two windows on the 30th floor of the 50-story building. Video from the scene shows at least three apartments in the high-rise fully engulfed in flames. [Link]Television views of the fire showed flames shooting out of four windows and smoke that streamed up into the sky, visible for miles. [Link]
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p>THERE IS NO INDICATION OF TERRORISM:
“We haven’t heard from any of our facilities that anything’s missing.” New York City government source told CNN there are “no indications of terrorism…” [Link]The FBI has told the BBC that there is no indication that the crash is terrorism-related. [Link]
A senior Homeland Security official said there is no indication of terrorism, but rather it the incident appeared to be a “terrible accident“. [Link]
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p>But these are the sorts of events that make people scared and angry, and these are the sorts of times when people feel justified acting out their racism as a hate crime. Please be careful tonight. I know I’ll be looking over my shoulder as I get in and out of my car, especially once the news gets out. It’s times like these that I wish I lived in a large city on the coasts, and not a smallish conurbation in the midwest where I encounter enough racism even on a regular basis.
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p>UPDATE 1 :
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p>The fire seems to be largely out now:
16 engine and 9 ladder companies have responded; most of the fire has been extinguished…. A total of four people have been confirmed dead – two people from the plane, two people from the building. Additionally, the aircraft was a Cirrus 20, which supposedly has a parachute for emergencies. [Link]
Multiple shots of the building right now available from Gawker.
Update 2: Stranger than fiction – blame the Yankees?
New York Yankees manager Joe Torre says the plane that crashed into a building in Manhattan is registered to team pitcher Cory Lidle[Link]
What could be more all American than that? Maybe it will put an end to all the speculation that this is somehow terror related.
Update 3: It is Cory Lidle’s plane. While this was a tragedy where 2-4 people may have died, I feel no guilt for the relief coursing through my veins right now. This was the only way that a plane crashing into a NYC building would have been conclusively decoupled from terrorism in its reporting – it was a famous person, an athlete, a YANKEE, whose plane it was. This will change the entire framing of the event.
On NY1 right now: Apparently an accident, not terrorism; small aircraft, maybe plane, maybe helicopter; crashed into an upper floor of an apartment building facing the East River; two reported fatalities.
Just heard about this too (immediately posted it on the News Tab here) and i sincerely hope it was just an accident. About to head into the city myself for a gala, thanks for the advice and be safe everybody
I knew Steinbrenner was furious over losing to the Tigers, but not this mad.
FAA is confirming it’s a small plane, not a helicopter.
Updates from Gothamist. And Ennis, according to one commenter there, the early TV news coverage is exactly what you might have predicted:
Yes, be careful tonight, everyone….
LOL
GO METS…game 1 baby!!
There are police helicopters in the air, the relentless whine of sirens. A scare there, for a moment. Ah, the age of scares.
But everything seems to be under control now.
Not that it ever is.
The din of all the choppers in the air right now is really eerie. I have a friend who works for Sothebys who was evacuated and says the flames have died down a lot and the smoke isn’t bellowing out like it had before. 2 confirmed deaths so far. Sad but an accident as per NORAD & FAA. I always thought it was amazing that they allowed planes to fly over Manhattan post 9/11.
It’s not only the national news networks; WNBC’s guy was saying things to the effect of “I wonder how firefighters must’ve felt when they heard that they’d be fighting a fire in a building hit by a plane. Echos of 9/11?”
Also, the AP initially reported, “Police say an aircraft has crashed into a building on Manhattan’s Upper East Side at 72nd Street and York Avenue. It is near Rockefeller Center.” Wha??!?! (They’ve changed it since the report broke.)
a light bulb jus went off above my head
today is 10/11
Yeah I was all livid over it too. I was like didn’t someone at least check a map to see where Rockfeller Center is from 72nd street?
More comments from Gothamist:
First: “[the] anchor on CNN just said that the building is located “on East 72nd street; about mid-way between Wall Street and UPSTATE NEW YORK.”” [at least this one is just garden-variety dumb, rather than fear-mongering by suggesting a nearby terrorist target.]
Second: “10-11-06. Read that date upside down.” [Riiight.]
Scary! Thanks for the headsup.
Yeah, they got it mixed up with Rockefeller University, which is in fact in that area.
I work two blocks from the crash site and walked over there earlier before all of the large police command vehicles showed up. Traffic has been closed off, and there are lots of emergency vehicles around. Phone service is still out, so if you are trying to get in touch with friends/loved ones here, you may have to wait.
Peace all.
Some pictures here (not from me).
AP, meet Google Maps.
True dat, double true.
Correct. Rockefeller, Sloan-Kettering and Cornell Med School are all here.
damn..how to they come up with these things…
i go to hunter college on 68th & lexington, they cancelled class and we could hear the sirens. earlier we could see the smoke. and it doesn’t help that it’s cloudy and overcast. eerie.
“10-11-06. Read that date upside down.”
freaky
90-11-01?
Ok, yeah…so the terrorists are now taking out CONDOS on the UES? C’mon people, seriously. If this is true, then they must hate the real estate market even more than I do. I can just picture it now:
“Osama, we are having a terrible time setting up our sleeper cell in Manhattan.”
“Why? Security is so tight?”
“No. Actually, it’s…rent controls.”
“Ahhhha…hmmm. Well. I have a plan!”
Just because CNN likes getting itself all into a lather doesn’t mean the rest of us have to follow suit.
New York Yankees manager Joe Torre says the plane that crashed into a building in Manhattan is registered to team pitcher Cory Lidle.
Could this be related to their horrible loss this weekned?
Shuffle the numbers around…or add the first two digits. 9 + 0 = !!! OMG! It is true. This is eerie.
What’s up with the whole “The plane was a Cirrus 20, which has a parachute for emergencies” bit?
The emergency chute is for the whole plane in case of catastrophic engine failure at high altitudes. I wouldn’t really expect it to work too well after the plane hit a building at 220mph and burst into flames.
I’m not worried about it being anything other than an accident. I’m a bit concerned that other people might assume that it’s terrorism, and I’ll have to deal with the corresponding sh*t, which I’m not looking forward to.
Update: NY Times says “Yankees Pitcher Cory Lidle Was Killed in the Plane Crash, High-Ranking City Official Says”
The headline have changed to “Yankees pitcher feared dead.”
Well, there goes my theory that it was a Sox fan.
Wow that’s really just surreal…
This just in: Dinesh D’Souza Blames Yankees’ Last Loss and Cory Litle’s Last Flight on Liberal Leftists! Extry Extry! Read all about it!
Salil you’re acting like the CNN of sarcasm!
Salil, I suspect I’m not the only New Yorker who finds your humor about the crash completely unwanted.
so, he did have a hand in this….
Show Salil some love, BB. He’s making fun of the pundits, not the crash.
so i’m in my apartment on york ave just 10 blocks away from the crash. I smell smoke and hear sirens but i’m consumed with work and defending dinesh d’souza so i pay no notice. my mom calls (naturally) and I hear worry in her voice when she says “Manju?” i think she should have been relieved at that point hey, i live on the same damn street as the crash so i won’t quibble…it’s not like the time she woke me up in venezuala at 4 in the morning because princess diana just died, and naturally, she thought i was dead too.
anyway, it was raining hard by the time i got down there and the streets were blocked off around 73rd an york. so i didn’t see much. I saw anderson cooper though. 2 chinese ladies looked at me funny…they probably thought i was a NY Ynnkee pitcher.
Yeah, dude. BB, did you not read the previous post?! C’mon, man…lighten up.
He didnt play in the whole series. Someone took it to heart!
dang gina, that was funny
perhaps I’m reading this wrong, but this sounds just like the “fear” responses I heard/read about on 9-11, etc. this makes it sound like “uh oh, a small plane crashed in NYC…the sky is falling…better call everyone…” does someone call all of their loved ones everytime they read about a car, bus, etc., crash?
just like automobile crashes happen every so often, things in the air will crash and fall down, and NOT have anything to do with OBL and crew. i’m tired of this over, fear-fostered (thanks GOP) response to everything…shoot first, ask questions later.
Heh heh:
and hopefully no one follows suit of this loser doing a sad “Jon Stewart” routine
Jaa Louis:
I’ve got my own site to handle stupidity. What I come up with is mine-all-mine, so don’t try and attribute my stupidity to that guy. Give credit where credit is due, otherwise I’ll accuse you of channeling Dubya whenever you type.
The first reports that came out of 9/11 eeirely said the same thing, “a small plane crashed into WTC”. Panic was justified.
whew:
I don’t really think panic was justified then, either. Panic is blind, unreasoned, and frequently damaging. And I definitely don’t think the US should panic whenever something blows up or crashes…or at any other time. But that’s just me; clearly plenty of people are thrilled to start with the flag-planting, heroic-silhouetted-figures-in-black-and-white-photograph-montages, and “we-shall-prevail-boy-this-shit-is-serious-ism” anytime anything that remotely resembles a terrorist attack happens.
Are there that few people who actually believe another terrorist attack on US soil is that unlikely? If not, then…has no one done any emotional loin-girding in the last 5 years? None at all? We’re not the slightest bit wiser as a nation? I say this as I move back to the nation’s capital: I remember very clearly what happened on 9/11, and it wasn’t just NYC, remember? I’m just tired of people taking every goddamn truck backfire as an opportunity to trot out the same tired crap: raise the threat level to Beige (“Remain calm…remain very calm…in fact, just go to sleep”), draw analogies to 9/11, begin a new ridiculously-titled-scroll-bar on CNN (“FEAR? DOES IT SCARE YOU YET?”), start accusing the other political party of being “weak on terror” when clearly the whole goddamn country is ridiculously good with terror.
Terror: we have it down COLD.
Dealing with terror? Not even a little bit.
So pardon me if I need to laugh at this shit. Because I really…just…can’t take it seriously anymore.
Panic is never justified. That is my only observation for today.
We all need a bit of a reality check and put this accident into context. TWO people died and however this may resonate post 9/11 the 655,000 Iraqis killed as a result of the US led invasion is a far bigger tragedy and yet I see no Sepia mention or write ups. Check the digits we’re taking more than half a million deaths. Desi’s gotta get militant not sit on our brown arses playin’ identity politics!
Check the article in the UK Guardian paper http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,1892888,00.html