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Marine jet crashes in residential area
LOS ANGELES - A US military jet carrying four 225 kilogram (500-pound) bombs Wednesday crashed into a residential suburb in Arizona, forcing the evacuation of 1,300 homes, authorities said.The US Marine Corps Harrier jump jet ploughed into a garden of a house in the city of Yuma, injuring one civilian on the ground, but the pilot walked away for the crash site, military spokesmen told AFP. "A Harrier crashed in residential central Yuma," Marine Corps Private First Class Robert Botkin told AFP. "The pilot ejected safely and walked away." But the spokesman for the Marine Corps Air Station in Yuma said: "They are evacuating a one-mile (1.6 kilometer) radius around the crash site as the jet was carrying live ordnance." Emergency officials from Yuma county said that 1,300 homes and a small shopping center had been evacuated as the wreckage was cleared and the bombs made safe. The aircraft, which is capable of vertical take-offs and landings but which has had a spotty safety record, was also carrying 300 round of 20 millimeter ammunition in addition to its cargo of large bombs. The Marine base's emergency operations center confirmed the plane was carrying ordnance and that an evacuation of residents was underway and that those displaced were being put up in a nearby high school gymnasium. Marine Corps spokesman Major Nat Fahy said in Washington that the British designed AV-8B Harrier was on a training mission when it crashed at around 2:30 pm local time (2230) GMT. He said the pilot was taken to hospital but his condition was not immediately known and that a civilian had also been injured in the crash. "I am told it was near a residential area and there is one injury confirmed, and that civilian is on the way to the hospital as well," he said. Posted by: Steve White 2005-06-16 |
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