Above: AP News photo from the crash site. Below: Smoke from the F-18 Crash taken with my camera phone from the office window. The F-18 was on approach to Miramar Airbase (think Top Gun) when it crashed in University city, about 1 mile short of the runway. There were 2 confirmed fatalities and 2 missing in the impacted house; a mother, 2 children and their grandmother were reportedly in the house. The pilot safely ejected.
Overall, while it is a lot of fun watching the F-18s fly over the office (and I could watch them for hours), incidents like this bring home an awareness that low flying military jets over civilian areas comes with risk. This is the first military jet I recall crashing in a residential area within San Diego. However, a PSA passenger jet crashed in North Park in 1978 with horrific results. Another military jet crashed in 2006 in an uninhabited area perhaps a mile from Scripps Ranch.
4 comments:
When is San Diego going to build a new airport? Landing there between city buildings is unnerving no matter how many times they succeed. Maybe this will cause the uproar that brings the necessary change.
Wait, this was at MIramar, not downtown. Wow. That's about a mile or so from my mother-in-law's house.
But they should still move the airport out of city limits.
i was amazed at what a non-condemning attitude the father of the family that was killed had after this crash
I can only hope that, in the midst of anything even half as bad, I could be so graceful. On the other hand, what's the chance of a jet plane landing on your own, particularly when everyone is home but you?
There was an online discussion about moving both airports out of the city. I'm not sure that would have prevented this since he had to get from the carrier to the airport. Why he didn't land at Ford Island is beyond me though. I have mixed feelings about moving the commercial airport (slightly different topic) since I really like the current proximity.
Instead, I wondered if they couldn't do what Osaka, Hong Kong and Honolulu did and build out into the bay. They could build a runway where harbor island currently is and have a second approach out from the ocean. I'm sure a few people would miss having their yachts there but hey...its that or drive out to the desert every time you fly.
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