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Susan Montoya Bryan/Related Press
Army fighter jets intercepted an unresponsive airplane that flew over Washington, D.C., earlier than the airplane crashed in mountainous southwest Virginia on Sunday afternoon, officers mentioned. The supersonic speeds of the responding fighter jets produced a loud growth heard over the nation’s capital area.
The Federal Aviation Administration and the Nationwide Transportation Security Board are investigating the incident.
A Cessna Quotation plane, a enterprise jet, departed from Elizabethton, Tenn., and was certain for Lengthy Island MacArthur Airport in New York, the FAA mentioned. However as a substitute of touchdown, the airplane rotated over Lengthy Island and flew a straight path over D.C.
NORAD (North American Aerospace Protection Command) F-16 jets intercepted the Cessna airplane round 3:20 p.m., NORAD mentioned in an announcement. The pilot was discovered unresponsive, NORAD mentioned, and the army plane tried to make contact with the Cessna pilot till the airplane crashed close to the George Washington Nationwide Forest in Virginia.
“The NORAD plane have been approved to journey at supersonic speeds and a sonic growth might have been heard by residents within the area,” NORAD mentioned.
Earlier than crashing in Virginia, the airplane flew over D.C. at an altitude of 34,000 toes, in line with monitoring information from FlightAware.
Because it flew over the nation’s capital area, the Capitol Complicated was briefly positioned on an elevated alert till the airplane left the world, a Capitol police spokesperson mentioned in an announcement.
Virginia State Police mentioned in an announcement that it was notified of a attainable plane crash at 3:50 p.m. within the Staunton/Blue Ridge Parkway area.
“Search efforts are nonetheless underway by state and native regulation enforcement,” a state police spokesperson mentioned in an electronic mail Sunday night. “Nothing has been situated right now.”
The NTSB will lead the investigation and supply future updates, the FAA mentioned. NPR has reached out to the NTSB for extra data.
NPR’s Joe Hernandez and Russell Lewis contributed to this report.
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