Aircraft Crashes into NY Building

Well, I know I'm in some testosterone territory (wafts..) but I'm interested, both by heritage (as Timber may remember, my dad once wrote a tv series on the history of flight, 'nother story) and by curiosity about the present situation. Uh, did anyone look at my links, expecially the second one about it not likely being a stall? Whomever was quoted seemed to have cred. I don't mind it being refuted.

I can see where the Orion could get into deep **** in a canyon of buildings.
Reminds me of the first Cinerama, I think it was the first, with a flight through the grand canyon... ('nother relative involved in that). Don't remember the plane...

What's missing in this thread, an article (and by now more articles) I saw and didn't post, is anything about the two women who were in a condo the plane came into. There's a story. I've seen lots of articles mentioning no one hurt but those in the plane and slight hurt to firefighters. But while the housekeeper alerted the condo resident, and got her out of there, the resident had burns; both survived, it said, because they - or one of them - thought to shut the doors behind them as the flames roared in.

I did look at the articles you linked, osso - good stuff, can't see anything in 'em to argue with. I dunno if anybody knows whether or not a stall had occurred; just one of many as-yet unanswered questions. The damage to the building does indicate the plane hit it relatively square nose-on, to myeye; the torn-up masonry would be consistent more with the solid metal emngine slamming disrectly into it than with a glancing blow or a hit centered somewhere else on the aircraft's essentially plastic structure - not a lot of metal in that particular puppy. Somebody else mentioned a car hitting the only tree around for miles or some such thing - not altogether an inapt comparison - single-vehicle accidents without survivors and single-aircraft accidents without survivors often are devilishly tricky to reconstruct with precision. One easily can see what happened, but why it happened is another story entirely.

The more I look at what IS known, the more it seems to me the tragedy was heavily consequent to pilot error. Something else may have played into it, or not, but I now firmly believe that had the pilot - whichever of the two aboard was flying the machine - not been "Operating while terminally stupid", the story, however it may turn out, wouldn't be a story in the first place.

Did the pilot know anybody in the room which lay directly behind the window into which he flew and if he did was it a woman?

They always told me that if there's any trouble there's a woman at the back of it somewhere.

Is this the thread to make jokes about the Yankees and pitching?

smiles..



OK, I've a dumb question..
ok, here goes - the plane hit the building, let's assume square to it, nose first.
Plane and bodies fell to walk in front of the building. Where is the gas tank?
Why was the massive fire in the building and not below on the street?

Here's the story of the two women in the condo, if anyone missed it.link to boston.com article (AP)

The fuel tanks of that plane are in the wings (28 US Gallons each), immediately adjacent to the fuselage. Physics being physics, it is reasonable to conclude that impact forces caused the wing assemblies to separate from the fuselage, with consequent rupture of fuel tanks and lines. Physics being physics again, it is reasonable to conclude the liquid fuel would behave as would any other liquid in motion; it would tend to continue movng in the direction, and at the velocity, it had at the moment of impact. Fluid dynamics would suggest a fair amount of liquid - and some vaporized - fuel would be expected to continue forward following the sudden halt of the airframe's mass with consequent catastrophic structural failure at time of impact. Looking at the fire damage to the exterior of the building, and the photos of the aircraft wreckage at ground level, it is obvious as well that considererable fule spilled down the exterior facade of the building and also that considerable fuel remained with the aircraft's wreckage, as the fire at street level was intense, with unmistakable signature of burning petroleum product, consistent with gasoline and lubricants.

Sidebar - one of the women who's condo was hit was the woman severely injured several years ago when a balloon went out of control during a Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, knocking over a lamp post.

Third time's the charm....



Thanks for the 'splaining.

I've received e-mails from a few folks asking if I'm okay. Yes, I am. I live on the Upper East Side but not as close to the crash site as Flyboy. Also not as close as Blatham's shop.

Sorry I didn't think to show up sooner. Not only would people have known that I was okay, but I would have gotten to read this thread, which is chock full of insight and information. Thanks for that.

I could say many things about this incident. But I'll say only one. Enough with the planes flying into buildings in this city--or anywhere else for that matter.

I didn't post about you, Robbie, since I know your whereabouts, except, ack, one isn't always at home. I can only guess - well, leap to being you.

I agree with you on what is this **** with the small plane access. I know this is a larger question, re keeping flights away from cities, this city one of several.

Obviously there are pros and cons.

The idea that things are handled with small planes checking in - if they are newly required to - seems ludicrous to me.

Osso, When I moved from the Bronx to Manhattan many years ago, one of the things I noticed was the absence of planes flying overhead. The airspace above Manhattan is generally clear.

You have a sense of where I am in relation to other things in NY. Some folks don't. I was in the neighborhood two days after the crash. You just never know.

And you would expect the airspace above Manhattan to be clear - planes should be flying at altitudes much higher than the buildings. I know they do helicopter flights at low altitudes but they can turn on a dime. I had no idea they allowed planes to fly "below deck" like this on sightseeing tours up and down the river corridors. I bet the rules change.

Anybody remember the original MS Flight Simulator? Where did it take off from, and what was usually the first obstacle you encoutered?

Back when the Empire State Building was new, a small plane flew into it. I believe that this was the impetus for changing the laws about flying planes over Manhattan.

Unless there was an earlier one you refer to, the plane that flew into the Empire State Building in 1945 was a B-25, medium bomber, not particularly large by today's standards (nor for that matter was the B-17) but was very ruggedly built.

It wasn't a "small plane", it was a twin-engine Mitchell B-25 Medium Bomber, fuselage length 53', wingspan 67½', overall height 15'9" exluding its twin vertical stabilizer assemblies, empty weight around 10½ tons, normal operational weight around 17-18 tons including bombload, armament, crew (of 5 to 8 depending on mission), and fuel.



It was lost in fog, travelling relatively slowly (the plane was capable of a maximum airspeed of 275mph at 15,000 feet altitude, considerabley less at sea-level), and was not laden with tens of thousands of gallons of fuel (even in long-range ferry configuration, stripped of armament, with additional bomb bay tanks, waist tanks in place of gun emplacements, and external drop tanks, the plane's maximum fuel capacity was barely 1500 gallons).

The plane that crashed into the Empire State Building

So the Empire State Building wasn't that new, and the plane wasn't that small. Otherwise, I was entirely accurate.


Thanks for filling me in.

Roberta, you need to stop reading my posts. I think they're affecting you.

When I recalled the plane crashing into the Empire State Building, I think I combined that knowledge with visions of King Kong (the original) and the small planes flying around the building.

I'm getting old. What can I tell ya?

Me too. But it beats the alternative!

I just read this entire thread..........I don't know why, but I did....I need to go to bed and stop this insanity.

The experience was frightening for a short while until we learned that it was not a terrorist act. I had just sat down to lunch at a restaurant a few blocks away (1st and 76th) with my daughter who had just arrived for a short visit. Bernie called and told us the news, just as our food was arriving. It was upsetting to see some pedestrian's responses. One woman in particular came running down the street talking on her cell phone and looking very frightened. I suppose residents of the building suffered a huge scare. Can you imagine if your family members were there while you were out?

When we left the restaurant we looked down 1st avenue and the entire street was filled with emergency vehicles. We walked down 75th to York and the same was true on York as well. By the time we got there, the fire was already out, but there were a lot of worried New Yorkers (including me and my daughter) standing on the street looking at the three story black spot on the building.

The next day I was standing in a line at the bank. The TV news was reporting about the incident and the man in front of me looked at me and with a serious look on his face said, "you know, they say it was a suicide. There's something fishy about the whole thing." I just looked at the guy, I couldn't think of anything to say to such an unbelievably stupid statement. So I looked at the guy standing behind me, expecting him to roll his eyes with me. But he said, "It's probably true. The first thing they found was his passport. Now why would someone have their passport in a place where it could fall to the ground unless they wanted to be sure to be identified." I couldn't believe it so I finally just said, "well, I don't think so." People want to believe the wildest conspiracy theories they can image. It always surprises me.

P.S. Hi Spendi.......I see you're still being provocative.