W USA 9 News at 11 starts right now
with new details on that loud boom you
may have heard today.
Calls about a loud explosion
started pouring in around 3:15 this
afternoon across our region, WSA 9.
Spent the hours since then
tracking down what happened.
Thanks for joining us this evening.
I'm Delia Gonsal.
Right off the bat, I want to let
you know this was not an explosion.
It was a Sonic boom,
and it was connected to a deadly
plane crash in southwest Virginia.
So here are three things you need
to know about how this went down.
Sometime before 3:00 this afternoon,
a Cessna entered restricted
airspace over Washington, DC.
Now the plane took off.
Off from Elizabeth Municipal
Airport in Tennessee,
with four people on board,
a pilot and three passengers,
that plane was headed for Long Island,
New York.
Shortly after it crossed
into the restricted zone.
the US Department of Defense scrambled
fighter jets to intercept that plane.
Now one of those jets was going supersonic,
breaking the sound barrier and causing that
loud boom and this reaction from that dog,
that couple playing the instruments.
And we all heard that around 3:15.
Now, according to NORAD,
The Jets intercepted the civilian aircraft at
3:20 and try to get the pilot's attention,
but reported the pilot was unresponsive.
That plane ended up crashing
in Southwest Virginia,
going down in the George
Washington National Forest.
Around Augusta County and Stanton.
Now this video of the scene we just
received around the crash site,
It just came into our newsroom.
WUSA Nine learned just an hour ago.
Crews have found the remnants of that plane.
Unfortunately, there were no survivors.
Now we're still waiting on more details
about who was on that plane at the time
and what possibly could have gone wrong.
Right now though,
let's bring in Rafael Sanchez Cruz.
He is live tonight on Capitol
Hill with the local impacts.
Of these events, Rafa,
I know a very changing story,
fast moving,
developing story,
but certainly quite a scare earlier
this afternoon.
Without a doubt, Delia,
shortly after that loud boom,
DC's Homeland Security and Emergency
Management put out a tweet saying there
is no threat to the District of Columbia.
US Capitol Police say they
were made aware of the plane
flying over the Capitol region,
which prompted them to temporarily
place the US Capitol grounds on
what they're calling elevated alert
until the plane left our area.
That loud boom.
That we're talking about
flooded social media with
people wondering what was that?
It's the boom that was heard
across the DMV, waking Rocket
from his nap and Fairfax station
not far away. The loud noise interrupted
Travis at his wife, Hannah and
Fairfax as they recorded this video.
In Prince George's County, Maryland,
WUSA Nine chief photographer Kurt Brooks
and his family were stunned by the
sound as they packed their car in buoy,
a similar reaction from Hannah
Scott and her family in Crofton,
MD, the Sonic boom prompting
911 calls across the region.
I'm proposing her 3156 Monroe St. Northeast.
This emergency call in DC detailing
the confusion among District
residents flagging down fire rescuers
give a lot of people flying in this down,
a lot of bystanders saying they don't
know you where the sound came from.
You're probably gonna get
multiple calls on this.
The Associated Press reporting that
President Joe Biden was actually
golfing at Joint Base Andrews when
those fighter jets were authorized
to take off US Secret Service,
saying that the president's movement
was not interrupted by today's incident.
I'm live on Capitol Hill to
get back to you, Rafael.
Lots of moving parts today.
Thank you so much for putting it
all together for us this evening.