CLARENCE, N.Y. — The woman and daughter who barely escaped when an airplane plowed into their house, killing the woman’s husband and all 49 people aboard the plane, returned to the catastrophic scene Wednesday.
While she was there, investigators continued to collect evidence that they hope will tell them what brought down the aircraft.
Karen Wielinski and other relatives, including her daughter Jill, stayed at the site about 15 minutes. Police formed a human barrier to shield them from photographers. The Wielinskis did not speak with reporters Wednesday.
Their house was destroyed when Continental Connection Flight 3407 from Newark, N.J., to Buffalo fell from the sky last Thursday night and landed flat on top of the home.
In her only interview since the crash, Karen Wielinski, 57, told a local radio station she and her daughter were watching television when the aircraft smashed through the roof, pinning them in the wreckage.
“Planes do go over our house, but this one just sounded really different, louder, and I thought to myself, ‘If that’s a plane, it’s going to hit something,’ ” Wielinski told WBEN-AM the day after the crash. “The next thing I knew, the ceiling was on me.”
Wielinski said she pushed her way out of the debris and crawled through a hole in the wreckage as fire erupted around her. She said 22-year-old Jill Wielinski managed a similar escape, but her husband, 61-year-old Douglas Wielinski, was trapped.
“To me, it looked like the plane just came down in the middle of the house, and unfortunately, that was where Doug was,” she said.
Investigators on Wednesday removed part of the tail, the largest piece of the aircraft still intact.
The National Transportation Safety Board will examine whether the pilot overreacted when an automatic safety system sensed the plane was slowing down dangerously, said Lorenda Ward, the board’s chief investigator.
The pilot pulled back on the plane’s controls after the safety system tried to push the nose downward to gain speed and increase lift. Ward said one of many possibilities is the pilot pulled back too hard, bringing the plane’s nose too high up in an attempt to prevent the stall and dooming the aircraft.
