WASHINGTON – A 70-year-old pilot sustained serious injuries after crashing a plane into a mobile home in Anne Arundel County, Md., Thursday morning.
The single-engine Beechcraft Muskateer aircraft crashed into the mobile home at 13 South Bruce St. in Laurel in the Parkway Village Trailer Park at about 10:15 a.m.
The family that lived in the mobile home wasn’t there when the plane crashed into it.
Just after 10 a.m., authorities arrived at the scene after neighbors called 911 reporting a plane crash. A preliminary investigation revealed the plane had just taken off at Suburban Airport in Laurel, Md. No information has been released on where it was headed.
Witnesses told investigators the plane appeared to be flying low and struck a tree and two homes before crashing to the ground and colliding with the home at 13 Bruce St., according to a Maryland State Police news release.
The plane’s pilot Ronald H. Dixon, of Bowie, Md., sustained serious but non-life- threatening injuries in the crash, according to the Maryland State Police. He was the only person in the plane.
Anne Arundel County police said Dixon was alert and conscious when authorities arrived.
There were no other injuries, police posted on Twitter.
Dixon was taken to the University of Maryland Shock Trauma Center in Baltimore.
Due to the severity of the crash and the subsequent fuel leak, the crash site remained closed through the day.
A resident of the affected mobile home said she was walking her children to a nearby home when she said she heard a crash, turned around and saw her own home on fire.
Neighbors jump to action to help pilot
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Megan Cloherty, WTOP reporter
John Carter, who lives in the mobile home next door, said he heard the plane collision, which missed his own home by about 50 feet. The neighbor and another man ran to the plane and extracted the pilot, who he said was covered in gasoline.
Anne Arundel fire and police units, as well as Maryland State Police, responded to the scene. About 50 firefighters used foam to prevent the plane from catching fire. Representatives from the National Transportation Safety Board and Federal Aviation Administration are investigating the crash.
Officials evacuated a few homes in the immediate vicinity as a precaution for a few hours Thursday.
Below is a map of the location of the crash:
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The cause of the crash remains under investigation.
Megan Cloherty contributed to this report. Follow @WTOP on Twitter.
