Sonic boom caused by fighter jets heard in Virginia
A Florida businessman, known as a prominent donor to conservative political causes, has identified himself as the owner of the private jet that crashed in the Virginia wilderness on Sunday after it flew over Washington DC’s restricted airspace.
There was a loud sonic boom across the capital as two F-16s were scrambled to meet the Cessna Citation jet, which flew by sensitive sites including the White House and the US Capitol before coming down in a sparsely-populated mountain region.
John Rumpel, 75, owner of Encore Motors of Melbourne, was quoted by The Washington Post as saying that his “entire family” had been on the plane when it crashed, listing his daughter, a two-year-old granddaughter, her nanny and a pilot as being on board.
First responders told CNN that the crash left a “crater” in rural Virginia and that they found human remains at the scene.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) told The Independent that the private aircraft had taken off from Elizabethtown, Tennessee, bound for Long Island, but eventually crashed near Staunton, about 150 miles southwest of DC, in the Shenandoah Valley.
