Two dead and boy lucky to be alive after plane crashes into house
Two people have died and a young boy miraculously escaped with his life after a private jet crashed into three homes in Indiana.
The plane came down near a regional airport in South Bend, according to Roland Herwig, a spokesman for the Federal Aviation Administration.
Sky News reports that he said four people were on board the plane at the time, two of whom died in the crash.
He added that there was an indication that a mechanical problem was to blame.
At least three people were taken to Memorial Hospital with injuries that are not thought to be life-threatening.
Stan Klaybor, who lives across the street from the crash scene, said the jet clipped the top of one house, heavily damaged a second, and finally came to rest against a third. He told wsbt.com how a young boy in the third house luckily escaped without serious injury, saying: "Her little boy was in the kitchen and he got nicked here [pointing to his forehead]."
His wife, Mary Jane, who regularly watches planes approach the airport, said: "I was looking out my picture window. The plane's coming, and I go, 'Wait a minute,' and then, boom'.
"This one was coming straight at my house. I went, 'Huh?' and then there was a big crash, and all the insulation went flying."
The jet was a Beechcraft Premier 1 that had departed on Sunday afternoon from the Richard Lloyd Jones Jr Airport in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
The plane was registered to 7700 Enterprises of Montana LLC in Helena, Montana, a company that makes window film and paint overlay for cars.
Following the crash, electricity was cut off to part of the neighbourhood, and there was a mandatory evacuation because of the jet fuel leak. Buses transported up to 200 people to a nearby shelter.
Patricia Kobalski lives in one of the homes that was hit. She told wsbt.com: "I looked outside my back door and I saw part of a plane.
"I don't know how much of it there was in my house, but my roof was caved in and there was glass everywhere, the front of the house, windows busted out. I just grabbed my son and got him some clothes and we ran out.
"I'm still real scared actually. I'm still real shaken up because we could've been killed."
South Bend Assistant Fire Chief John Corthier said officials believe everyone connected with the damaged homes had been accounted for.
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