The Viking News reported Tuesday after a sailplane made an emergency landing at a Heartwell Park youth soccer training area, scattering debris and striking a female pedestrian in her 40s who was walking her dog.
Nearby residents, parents of youth soccer and baseball players and kids in jerseys gathered around the downed plane, and shared their thoughts on the crash.
Players from a girls youth soccer team and two parents look at the crashed sailplane at Heartwell Park in Long Beach on Tuesday. (Diosa Hippolyta)
“We were at Lakewood High School watching my son’s freshman game, we were playing Poly High School. All of the parents, all of a sudden, we saw this plane was super low,” Jillian Bates, a resident near the park, said.
“They thought maybe it crashed into a house because it disappeared, then all of a sudden there were lights and sirens. After the 44 years I have lived here, I have never seen anything like this,” Bates said.
Most bystanders at the scene were unaware of what exactly happened and did not witness the crash, but were surprised to see a downed plane among fields of children practicing youth sports and expressed concerns about safety.
“It’s scary… I think we have to start being aware of our surroundings and look up,” said Elizabeth Lopez-Dean, who was watching her two daughters, ages 8 and 10, practice near the wreckage site.
Speculation from bystanders included pilot error and weather issues having been the cause of the crash.
“He hit hard because he broke the gear off of (the aircraft). It’s pretty hard to break the gear off of one of those things,” Don Thomson, resident and Long Beach City College Flight Program alumni said.
Brittney Spyrs, a mother of two, expressed concern regarding the reasons for the crash and was initially fearful that helicopters were overhead searching for someone, and didn’t go outside to investigate.
“It’s scary, we are out here on Thursdays playing baseball right on that field,” Spyrs said.
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