Death toll from air ambulance crash in Philadelphia rises to seven

PHILADELPHIA — A person in a car was the seventh fatal victim of the fiery crash of an air ambulance onto a busy Philadelphia street, authorities said Saturday, as investigators sifted through burned cars, damaged homes and charred debris for clues to determine why the aircraft plummeted shortly after takeoff.

Carrying six people from Mexico, including a child who spent months in treatment at a hospital, the Learjet 55 went down just after departing from the Northeast Philadelphia Airport, creating what witnesses described as a massive fireball, shaking houses and leaving a chaotic street scene.

Authorities couldn’t yet say why the jet crashed. Adam Thiel, the city’s managing director, said it could be days — or longer — until officials are able to fully count the number of dead and injured across a sprawling impact zone in a densely populated area.

The plane took off, reached about 1,500 feet of altitude and then plummeted in a steep descent less than a minute after takeoff in what National Transportation Safety Board chair Jennifer Homendy called a “high-impact crash.”

As of Saturday morning, officials said, there were seven dead — six on the jet and the person in the car — and 19 injured. Most of the injured had been treated and released, hospitals said.

There are “a lot of unknowns about who was where on the streets” when the plane crashed, and it is possible that the casualty figures will grow, Thiel said.

The crash scene was at least four to six blocks, and authorities were working to assess the damage, including going house to house to inspect the dwellings, Thiel said.

Homendy said her agency’s staff was collecting debris from the plane and hauling it to a secure location to begin evaluating it.

The National Transportation Safety Board was still looking for the cockpit voice recorder, Homendy said.