Accident investigators are on the scene in Colonia, New Jersey, where a Cessna 414 crashed into a house in a residential neighborhood approximately three miles from Linden Airport around 11 a.m. yesterday morning. The pilot, Michael Schloss, 74, a retired doctor with decades of flight experience, including piloting warbirds such as the Douglas Skyraider as a member of the EAA, was heading to New York City from Leesburg Executive Airport in Virginia to give a lecture.
Schloss perished in the crash that set the home ablaze and damaged two neighboring houses. No one was home at the time of the accident, and there were no other injuries on the ground. Local officials reported the cabin-class piston twin plunged through the roof of the home.
According to the NTSB, the pilot was in communication with air traffic control and was cleared for an approach into Linden Airport. The aircraft subsequently lost radar contact and communications ceased without a distress call. Schloss had filed an IFR flight plan for the approximately one-hour trip before departure. Weather at the time of the accident was overcast and misty, with a ceiling below 1,000 feet.