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10-12-2012, 11:04 AM
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Plane Slams Into Crowded Naperville Gym, None Inside Hurt
A single-engine plane crashed into the roof of a crowded fitness center in Naperville, Illinois, on Oct. 6, 2010, sending fuel leaking into the gym below but injuring none of the roughly 280 people inside, according to authorities and news accounts of the crash. The Piper PA-32R-300 had taken off minutes earlier from Aero Estates, a residential airpark just south of the club, and was bound for Pittsburgh when it went down around noon, the National Transportation Safety Board later reported. The aircraft struck a turret over a top-floor basketball court at the XSport Fitness at 2780 Fitness Drive, near 75th Street and Route 59. The court was empty at the time. The pilot, Lloyd McKee, 66, and his wife, Maureen McKee, 63, both of Aero Estates, were pulled from the wreckage by Naperville firefighters and taken to Edward Hospital with broken bones and other injuries that were described as not life threatening, according to fire officials. No one in the building was hurt. Naperville dispatchers received the first 911 call at 12:04 p.m. "A plane just flew into the XSport fitness building," one caller told a dispatcher on recordings the city later released. "It went through the building. It's inside the building." Another reported gasoline pouring down into the gym, and callers said members were evacuating. Gym members told reporters they heard a loud noise and smelled fuel before they realized what had happened. One described the impact as sounding like weights being dropped, and staff said gasoline ran down from the ceiling. No fire broke out. In a report released in October 2012, the NTSB listed the probable cause as the pilot's failure to abort the takeoff after the airplane failed to reach enough speed and climb performance. Investigators said a detached coupling and a hole in the exhaust pipe had cut engine power, and that the pilot and two mechanics had not caught the defects before the flight.
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