A medical plane with six Mexican nationals on board crashed into an occupied neighborhood of Philadelphia on Friday, authorities said, that they mark another American aviation disaster after a passenger plane and a military helicopter collided in the air in Washington at the beginning of the early this week.
The video images seemed to show the double engine that descended at an acute angle towards a residential area, which caused a large fireball after the impact and shower for the remains on houses and vehicles.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said the plane was a Learjet 55, a commercial-Francis-Francés plane, which had taken off shortly before the northeast of Philadelphia to Branson, Missouri.
The accident occurred just after 6 pm (4 am pkt).
A girl who had been in the United States for medical care, her mother, and the members of the flight teams and doctors who accompanied her on board were killed in the accident, the hospital of the children who treated her said AFP.
“The patient had received attention from Shriners’s Children’s Philadelphia and was being transported back to her country of origin in Mexico in an air ambulance hired when the accident occurred,” said Mel Bower, spokesman for Shriners children.
The six on board were Mexican citizens, said the country’s foreign ministry in a statement.
“The airline company … confirmed to the Consulate that six people of Mexican nationality were traveling on the plane,” the Ministry wrote in X.
The operator, Jet Rescue Air Ambulance, confirmed in a statement to the US media. Uu. There were two passengers and four crew, adding: “At this time, we cannot confirm any survivor.”
Dozens of emergency workers were on the scene outside Roosevelt Mall, a shopping center in the northeast of Philadelphia with retailers and food outputs.
The president of the United States, Donald Trump, published Friday on his social platform of truth that was “sad” to see “more lost souls” in the tragedy of Philadelphia.
He praised the first to respond, adding: “God bless you all.”
The witnesses told local television teams that saw body parts in or near the remains, such as the member of the City Council of Philadelphia, Mike Driscoll, said he feared that residents or others on the ground could have been killed .
“It doesn’t look good. And it’s a sad situation here, “he said CNN.
The FAA said he was launching an investigation with the National Transportation Board Board.
Washington tragedy
Both agencies are already investigating the most fatal American air disaster in almost a quarter of a century, after a passenger jet operated by a subsidiary of American Airlines collided with a Black Hawk helicopter on Wednesday.
The plane with 64 people on board landed at the Reagan National Airport in Washington, just kilometers from the White House, when it crashed with the US Army helicopter. UU. In a training mission.
The divers were looking for Friday for the remaining bodies on the Potomac River, after having taken at least 41 from the water.
The researchers found the black box of the helicopter on Friday after recovering the voice data recorder and flight of the Bombardier plane operated by a subsidiary of American Airlines.
The officials are confident that the data can be completely extracted from the recorders, said NTSB member Todd Inman, added that an investigation was still being carried out.
However, the lack of clarity about the cause of the accident did not deter Trump’s politicized comment.
It seemed to blame the military helicopter in a publication on the social platform of truth, saying that it was “flying too high, by much”.
This followed a press conference on Thursday where the Republican attributed the fault of the accident to his Democratic predecessors Joe Biden and Barack Obama, claiming without evidence that they had hired the wrong people due to non -discrimination initiatives known as Dei.
Chesley Sullenberger, who was a passenger plane on the Hudson River in New York in 2009, told Network MSNBC He was “disgusted” but “not surprised” by Trump’s rhetoric.
Aviation experts focused on whether the helicopter crew could see through military night vision glasses, and if the control tower had little personal.
The collision was the first important accident in the United States since 2009, and the deadliest from a plane accident by American Airlines in Belle Harbor, New York in 2001 that killed the 260 on board.
Among those of the condemned Wednesday there were several American skaters and coaches, and the Russian couple Evgenia Shishkova and Vadim Naumov, who won the world title of couples of 1994.
Two Chinese citizens and a Filipino were also among the victims.
