Multiple people injured as plane crashes in suburban Pennsylvania

Five people have been rushed to hospital after a plane crash-landed in a parking lot of a suburban Pennsylvania retirement home. 

Dramatic footage showed the Beechcraft A36TC erupt in flames in the parking lot of Brethren Village in Manheim Township.

Medics, ambulances, and emergency vehicles rushed to the scene in Lancaster County as flames engulfed the plane and nearby vehicles.

The plane took off as scheduled on Sunday afternoon, but quickly requested to land back on the tarmac because its door had opened.

Horrifying air traffic control audio revealed the pilot telling ground agents that they needed to turn around – but at one point he said that he couldn’t hear the radio because of all the wind noise, caused by the unlocked hatch. 

The air traffic controller can be heard saying: ‘Pull up… the aircraft is down just behind the terminal in the parking lot tree area.’ 

In a statement to DailyMail.com, an FAA spokesperson said five people were on board the plane. They have all been transferred to local hospitals with various injuries.

Residents of the retirement home were instructed to ‘shelter in place’ as a precaution as initial investigations took place, but authorities have confirmed the pilot avoided nearby buildings and that nobody on the ground was injured. 

The aircraft’s tail can be seen in the wreckage, squashed up next to parked cars and surrounded by thick black smoke

Emergency services are seen working on the small plane crash in Pennsylvania 

The aircraft crash triggered a fiery inferno and caused multiple adjacent vehicles to burst into flames between Fairview Drive and Meadowview Court.

The tail of the plane, brandishing the code N347M, is seen in the wreckage squashed up next to parked cars and surrounded by thick black smoke billowing through the air.

The parking lot where the plane landed is just two streets away from Lancaster Airport – and the lot serves a nearby retirement home, Brethren Village. 

It is understood the plane was headed to Springfield-Beckley Municipal Airport in Ohio.

This comes after a particularly tumultuous start to the year for the aviation industry.

In January, sixty passengers, four crew, and three US Army personnel died after  American Airlines Flight 5342 smashed into a US Army Black Hawk helicopter as it came into land at Reagan National Airport.

Passengers aboard Flight 5342 from Wichita, Kansas, included members of the US figure skating team who were returning from the US Figure Skating Championships.

Smoke is seen billowing from the site of the aircraft crash

Days later a medical jet crashed in Philadelphia killing all six people on board. 

Then, a small plane carrying 10 crashed over Alaska, again killing everybody on board. 

In February, two people died after a pair of planes collided in midair at Arizona’s Marana Airport. 

Images showed one of the planes was left as a pile of rubble and ashes after it crash-landed next to the runway, while the other aircraft landed safely.

One of the aircraft involved appeared intact on the runway as cops raced to the scene, while a thick plume of black smoke could be seen over the airport and surrounding area shortly after the planes collided.