Spring Valley Pilot Crashes Plane Behind Swim Club In Bergen County

By TOM DAVIS (Patch Staff)

A Cessna 172 crash-landed into a tree in the field behind Cresskill Swim Club Thursday, seriously injuring two occupants, police said.

The plane was on a Coast Guard Auxiliary patrol of the Hudson River.

The pilot was Yaakov Yosef ben Leah Rochel of Spring Valley, who also volunteered with Chaverim of Rockland, according to theyeshivaworld.com.

No one on the ground was hurt, but some observers expressed relief that the plane did not strike a more populated section of the area.

Witness Frank Ruggiero told NBC New York he was at work when a colleague alerted him to the low-flying plane.

The 3rd Street Recreational Corridor is the town’s main recreational field and used for local sports, according to the report.

“My co-worker turned around and said, ‘There’s a plane coming right at us,’” he said. “We looked up and saw that it was heading right for the building across the way.

“It turned on its side a little bit and disappeared behind the building,” he said. “There was no smoke, no nothing. When it crashed, there was no smoke, no flames that I saw.”

Police Chief Edward Wrixon said the plane was doing patrols over the Hudson River when it began experiencing mechanical problems. The pilot checked in with a tower at LaGuardia Airport to try to land on the Hudson River but could not make it, and ended up crashing on the field, according to the NBC New York and Cliffview Pilot.

Photo courtesy of @peterhaskell880 @wcbs880

Patch Editor Lanning Taliaferro contributed to this report.