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US jet slides off Chicago runway; boy dies
(AP)
Updated: 2005-12-09 12:40 Midway was closed after the accident, and Abrams said she did not know when
it would reopen.
The Boeing 737 slid through the northwest corner of the airport, through the
boundary fence and into the road, according to the Federal Aviation
Administration's regional office in Chicago. Langford said at least two vehicles
were damaged, and one was pinned under the plane.
Midway, Chicago's second largest after O'Hare International, is closely
bordered by streets lined with homes and businesses. It serves more than 17
million travelers a year, many of them on Southwest.
A Southwest Airlines spokesman had no immediate information about the
accident. Southwest flies an all-737 fleet with over 400 aircraft.
Standard procedure calls for pilots to be tested immediately after a crash
for alcohol in their blood, FAA spokeswoman Laura Brown said in Washington, D.C.
National Transportation Safety Board and FAA officials from Washington were
on their way to Chicago to investigate.
While Abrams was confident runway conditions were not to blame, James
Burnett, a former NTSB chairman, said investigators would likely focus on the
weather.
"When you're looking at a runway overrun, it almost always involves a runway
condition that's improper," Burnett told WFLD-TV. "But that's not the only
thing."
Snow caused troubles for travelers across the Midwest on Thursday, with as
much as 10 inches on the ground in some areas.
The accident occurred 33 years to the day after a crash at Midway that killed
45 people, two of them on the ground.
In that crash, a United Airlines jet struck tree branches about a mile from
the airport, then hit the roofs of a number of bungalows before plowing into a
home, bursting into flames. Eighteen passengers survived.
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