Small Plane Crashes Into Maryland Home, Killing 6

A private plane crashed into a house in Montgomery County, Maryland, Monday killing the woman and two children inside as well as the three people aboard the plane. The crash was about a mile from the Montgomery County Airpark, the Washington Post reported.

Police told a news conference that Marie Gemmell, 36, her infant son Devon and toddler Cole, 3, were found on the second floor of the house, which was set ablaze by jet fuel. Police said her husband and a third child were outside the house.

“She tried to save these kids,” Police Chief Thomas Manger said. “She had nowhere to go. She couldn’t get out of the bathroom. One kid was between her legs, and the other was in her arms.”

Reuters reported a second home burned and the crash also damaged three others.

Reuters said the pilot of the ill-fated Embraer SA twin-engine Phenom 100 executive jet, Michael Rosenberg, had crashed another plane in 2010 at the airpark. No one was injured in that incident.

The plane in Monday's accident was registered to Rosenberg, an adjunct professor of epidemiology at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Rosenberg also was CEO of Health Decisions Inc., a clinical research company.

The National Transportation Safety Board said the plane had taken off from Chapel Hill at 9:30 a.m. Witnesses said the plane was circling with its wheels down and it looked like the pilot was struggling for control.