N.J. Crews Search for Plane Crash; Body Located

Jan. 16--Nearly five hours after witnesses reported seeing a light aircraft fly out of upper Bucks County and crash into a New Jersey hillside, officials were called Wednesday night to identify a body.

Officials were waiting for more information before making a statement, but the body reportedly was found in New Jersey's Holland Township, near Riegelsville-Milford and Spring Garden roads, where an ultralight plane crashed about 5 p.m.

At 9:45 p.m., a medical team from Hunterdon Medical Center was sent to the scene to assist in making "the pronouncement," according to emergency radio reports.

Well into the night, land and water emergency crews investigated the plane crash, which was reported by witnesses on the Upper Black Eddy and Holland Township sides of the river.

Four hours after the first reports, no aircraft wreckage had been located, and officials said a complete search could take time.

Dan Bush, deputy mayor of Holland Township, said local police were notified that an aircraft from Pennsylvania crashed about 5 p.m., but by 9:10 p.m. the township still had "no confirmed reports" a plane hit the ground or river.

Bush said rescue teams were looking through farms and forests in the western section of the township.

Just after 5 p.m., rescue boats were dispatched to the Delaware River to look for the plane in the area of 1900 River Road, Upper Black Eddy. At the same time, the search began in Holland Township.

One official radioed that a witness saw the aircraft plummet into the woods along Spring Garden Road in the township, in an area called the Narrows.

"I just spoke to a witness," an official radioed at 5:30 p.m. "It was a direct impact, according to him, in the Spring Garden area. According to the witness, he came straight down."

Search teams shifted their hunt to the area of 60 or 100 Spring Garden Road, near the Holland Township Municipal Building. The road is about a half mile from the Delaware River, a mile west of Milford, N.J., and a mile northwest of Upper Black Eddy.

Georgia Hergenrother, who lives on Spring Garden Road at the top of a hill, said a rescue team stopped by her home and looked around with flashlights, but appeared to have left the area by 6 p.m.

"They came to my house to see if I saw anything, but I didn't," she said. "A friend of mine said she saw it go over the top of her barn on River Road [in Holland Township]. I'm sure it's between my house and her house."

Hergenrother said it seemed a bad time to go up in a small plane.

"I can't imagine someone flying an ultralight in this kind of weather," she said.

Hunterdon County officials initially called for a helicopter, but an aerial search was called off because of the darkness and fog.

At 5:45 p.m., two boats on the river were called back to a boat launch. Bucks County emergency units abandoned their search on the Pennsylvania side.

On the New Jersey side, emergency dispatchers at 7:15 p.m. requested more personnel to pursue a land search. Two-and-a-half hours later, the searchers appeared to have found something.

At 10:20 p.m., fire police were asked to shut down nearly 3 miles of Route 627, from Crab Apple Road to the borough of Milford, while officials investigated the fatal crash. Route 627 includes Riegelsville-Milford Road and River Road.

-- Frank Warner

Copyright 2014 - The Morning Call (Allentown, Pa.)