2 rescued after plane hits transmission tower in Maryland
A plane crashed into a transmission tower in Maryland on Wednesday morning, killing its pilot and a passenger, who was found more than 500 feet above the ground.
The pilot, 45-year-old Gregory Connell of Frederick, Maryland, and passenger, 59-year-old Betty Jean Mireles of Gaithersburg, Maryland, died in the single-engine plane that hit the tower near the town of Chesapeake, Maryland, where they were from. Mireles works at the Maryland Transit Administration, and Connell was an executive for a business in Chesapeake.
Here’s what we know about the crash:
How the plane went off the ground
Mireles was sitting in a first-class seat on the right side of the plane, and the man who was the passenger pilot was sitting in a first-class seat on the left side of the plane, according to the National Transportation Safety Board’s preliminary report on the crash. Mireles had checked in for her flight at 8:52 a.m., and the plane took off at 8:56 a.m. and landed at Chesapeake Regional Airport at 8:59 a.m.
The crash was reported around 9:20 a.m. and was likely a “hit-and-run” in the initial minutes of the incident, according to the National Transportation Safety Board.
A witness told NBC Washington that he heard an explosion prior to the crash, and when he saw the plane hit his home, he called the police at 9:30 a.m. He watched the plane explode in flames.
“A plane was on fire and there were bodies on the ground,” the witness said. “…And then everybody was running towards the plane. I said, ‘This is a plane.’ And they said, ‘No, it’s a rocket.’”
The plane took off from George Washington International Airport at 9:24 a.m., according to the NTSB report.
The plane was registered to Flight Support Services LLC, which owns two planes that were under the same booking number, according to the FAA.
The pilot had no prior experience working with an aircraft, according to the