Small Plane Crashes Into B.C. Apt. Building, Killing Pilot

A terrible tragedy has hit a B.C. neighbourhood. A small plane crashed into an apartment building in the town of Richmond Friday afternoon. Witnesses reported seeing the craft, travelling at a high rate of speed, veer into the seventh and ninth floors of the residence. The pilot was killed and two people inside the building were injured, one seriously.  No one else was in the plane at the time.

The complex was evacutated as firefighters moved in to search for any survivors. The accident occurred at 4pm local time. Reports say at least 12 ambulances were seen racing to the area and one witness compared the scene to September 11th.  

There’s no explanation yet as to how the plane got so off course and headed into the structure.

Dr. Jas Bhopal is a psychiatrist whose office is on the first floor. He was on the phone waiting for a client when he “felt a vibration” and “smelled a dusty smell.” He ran outside and was stunned when he looked up. “On the ninth or tenth floor there was a huge gaping hole there, a shocking sight, reminded me of 9/11.”

There was at least one person the physician saw that couldn’t get out after the impact. “There was a  … Chinese lady and she was shouting something. And when I asked my Chinese neighbour what she was saying, the Chinese person said she was shouting “help, help!” I shouted up, “get out of there, get out of there,” but maybe she didn’t understand … It seemed she had no exit because she would spend time inside and come to the edge again of the big gaping hole and started shouting again. Perhaps the doors inside were blocked with the plane being in there.”

Amazingly, there was no real smoke or fire after the initial explosion, and Dr. Bhopal believes most of the debris went into the apartments and not to the ground below, possibly saving lives. “There were just one or two pieces of aluminum on the ground,” he observes.

Crystal Mason was driving with her husband and young son when she saw the plane flying erratically.

“I knew it was in trouble. It was going way too fast. The minute I saw it in the air before it was doing any kind of funny turn it was going way too fast,” she said.

“I knew it was going to crash. I really did. I knew it was going to crash. My thing was `My God we’re in downtown Richmond , where’s it crashing? How many people are around? How many people are going to get injured? What’s happening?”‘

The scene is close to Vancouver International Airport and there’s a lot of air traffic in the area, with planes constantly coming in for a landing or taking off.

The incident appears to be reminiscent of another well publicized disaster involving a plane, an apartment and a highly populated area. And it happened almost a year ago to the week of the B.C. tragedy. In the mid-afternoon of October 11, 2006, a light plane carrying two men went off course and slammed into the 30th and 31st floors of a 50-storey New York City condo, dropping debris and body parts onto the street below.

The only two casualties in that case were the two men onboard the craft, a pilot and his student, former Blue Jays pitcher Corey Lidle. It was later determined a strong wind and an inability to turn the plane properly contributed to the crash. But it will forever remain a mystery whether Lidle was at the controls when the accident took place.