A small plane crashed at a Florida mobile home park on Thursday, killing the pilot of the aircraft and two people on the ground, fire officials said.
The pilot of the single-engine Beechcraft Bonanza V35 reported an engine failure shortly before the aircraft went down at about 7pm local time, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) reported.
It crashed in a explosive fireball at the Bayside Waters mobile home park in Clearwater, about 30 minutes outside Tampa, Florida. The plane hit one home and left at least three others with fire damage, although the flames were quickly doused, the Clearwater fire chief, Scott Ehlers, said at a news conference.
“The aircraft was found in the one structure,” Ehlers said.
The death toll on Friday morning was given at three by the FAA – the pilot and two people on the ground, local station WFLA reported.
An accident report from the FAA said the plane “crashed under unknown circumstances” and resulted in a “post crash fire”. No other injuries were reported, according to the accident report.
#BREAKING: Three people died after a plane crashed in a Clearwater mobile home park Thursday, FAA says. What we know: https://t.co/zFKB24mFWL pic.twitter.com/hRSNKrH9t4
— WFLA NEWS (@WFLA) February 2, 2024
Ehlers said the pilot reported an emergency to the St Pete–Clearwater international airport shortly before the plane went off radar about three miles north of a runway. The airport is about seven miles south-east of Clearwater.
Ehlers told reporters that he was surprised there were not additional injuries or fatalities given that the plane crashed in a dense residential area, NBC News reported.
“We were very fortunate,” Ehlers said.
Residents living near the accident scene said they felt and heard the crash.
Kathy Benton told Spectrum News BN9 that she and her boyfriend went to the crash scene after hearing and feeling the crash from a block away.
“We didn’t know what it was but we got in our golf cart and we just came around the corner and we could see a big fiery inferno,” Benton said to BN9.
“[It] sounded like a crash. There were other people here, it was very upsetting to see,” she said.
Rick Renner, who also lives in the neighborhood, told NBC’s Today show that his house shook due to the crash. Renner recorded a video of the fiery accident.
“We heard what we thought what was like a motorcycle go by or something. Then a few seconds later it was a loud bang, the windows actually shook, the house shook,” Renner said in an interview with Today.
The FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board are investigating the incident.
The Associated Press contributed reporting
