And I think there was a mid-air between a Constellation and a DC-8 or 707 over Staten Island sometime around 1960.
Something about this doesn't make sense, though. The reported weather (at JFK) was a 1500-foot overcast ceiling with 8 miles visibility. Yeah, 8-mile visibility is fine for VFR flying, but why do you go flying VFR with a 1500-foot overcast ceiling, especially in a "twin-engine aircraft?" Any pilots got an idea?
}:-)4
Also a passenger jet crash in queens 2001.
I'm not going to speculate on this until all the facts are in...
Wouldn't flying IFR on a "sight seeing trip" be kinda pointless?
Maybe this sounds crazy but something about this rubs we wrong. We just had the president announcing how great the economy was today and then all of the sudden this a few hours later and now the stock market is going down down.
http://biz.yahoo.com/cbsm-top/061011/96635884817afee1bff2271885ab636c.html?.v=1
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- U.S. stocks fell to their lows for the session Wednesday after news reports that a small aircraft had crashed into a New York city building.
Stocks had already been under pressures after the minutes of the last Federal Reserve meeting on interest rates made clear that inflation remained a serious concern for central bank officials, dashing hopes among some investors for an early cut in interest rates.
I've never flown in the New York City airspace, but I understand that there is, or at least was, a corridor up a river there that is used for sightseeing and does not require the pilot to be in contact with ATC as long as you stay in a certain designated corridor. My understanding is that you do have to stay at a certain altitude block while you are in that corridor.
Generally, a 1500 feet ceiling , 8 miles visisbility would be enough to do some sightseeing in many areas if the area I was flying in permitted flying at or below that altitude without requiring the pilot to be under positive control by ATC. I personally would prefer more altitude but I guess if I had a guest that wanted to go flying just to sightsee and they wouldn't be available to wait for better weather I would fly in those conditions for that purpose if I knew the area well enough and I wasn't straying too far away from an airport, either the one I took off from or one I could safely get to in the event of an emergency of some kind.