Fatal Plane Crash Witness: 'It Was Coming Right At Me'

Tom O'Connell glanced out the window of his Howell Township home Wednesday night and witnessed a horrible sight. A small plane was headed right for his house. The , killing the two men aboard, Patrick L. Charles, 43, of Canton, and John J. Nowak, 70, of Westland. Funeral arrangements for the men are pending.

The crash is under investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board. And O'Connell, 72, is left with a vivid memory of the accident.

"It hit the window to the left, I was sitting looking at the other window, he was aiming right for me, and at the last minute he veered off to the left and hit the other window," O'Connell said. "I just hit the floor, so he wouldn't have got me in any event."

The plane crash isn't the first calamity O'Connell has experienced in his lifetime.

"Has stuff like this happened? Yeah, I was in Hurricane Camille, I've been in hurricanes. I've dodged a lot of bullets. This one was a close call," he said.

He even had an earlier scare since moving to his Howell home three months ago, a move he said he made to decide whether he wants to buy and develop the property.

He said a tornado that hit over Memorial Day weekend, ripping through some trees on his property, a large, wide-open area spanning 1,500 feet on M-59.

"It took down 20 trees in the backyard, I'm not talking about little trees, I'm talking about trees that were three feet in diameter, huge trees," he said about the tornado.

O'Connell is a commercial real estate broker and developer. He has plans to develop that property at 2800 Highland Rd. for commercial use. He's not sure if he's going to buy the house just yet.