A college student in South Carolina said he and his roommates are counting their blessings in the moments after a small plane narrowly lost his home and crashed into his backyard on Wednesday morning.
Charles Grondines, a 21-year-old student at the University of South Carolina, said his roommate witnessed the plane flying directly toward his home in Columbia through dense fog before doing what looked like an evasive maneuver.
“He’s coming straight at us and then he turns at the last second and his wing cuts through the roof of the house across from our street and then he kind of spins in our yard,” Grondines continued.
“We heard a big bang,” he said. “There was no explosion initially, and my roommate, who was outside, ran inside and said, ‘A plane crashed in our yard!'”
“We didn’t know what to do,” said Grondines. Since they had not seen a fire, they decided to go outside and help.
“And then it exploded,” said Grondines. “If that second explosion had happened a little later, it could have been very bad.”
The students, four of whom live together, believe he flew to avoid colliding with his home south of Publix supermarket on Rosewood Avenue.
“I’m sure that guy has passed, but if his intention was to land where it wouldn’t affect anyone else, he did a great job,” said Grondines. “It is definitely tragic what happened, but we are definitely counting our blessings.”
The Columbia Fire Department tweeted photos of a wide response operation around fallen tree branches
The coroner is involved, but the fire department did not comment on the plane’s occupant.
“The accident caused a house to catch fire,” said the department tweeted. “The occupant of the house suffered a minor injury unrelated to the accident. The fire is now out.”
Shelby Beckler, also a student at the USC who lives nearby, said small planes like this are common at Columbia’s Jim Hamilton – LB Owens airport.
