1945 Empire State Building B - 25 crash - wikipedia 1945 Empire State Building B - 25 crash Coordinates : 40 ° 44 ′ 54 '' N 73 ° 59 ′ 08 '' W ﻿ / ﻿ 40.74833 ° N 73.98556 ° W ﻿ / 40.74833 ; - 73.98556 ﻿ ( A Building ) 1945 Empire State Building B - 25 crash The Empire State Building on fire following the crash Accident Date July 28, 1945 Summary Controlled flight into terrain ( building ) Site Empire State Building, New York City Aircraft Aircraft type B - 25 Mitchell Aircraft name Old John Feather Merchant Operator U.S Army Air Forces Registration 41 - 30577 Flight origin Bedford Army Air Field Bedford, Massachusetts Destination Newark Liberty International Airport Crew Fatalities 14 ( 11 in building and 3 crew ) The Empire State Building B - 25 crash was a 1945 aircraft accident in which a B - 25 Mitchell bomber, piloted in thick fog over New York City, crashed into the Empire State Building. The accident did not compromise the building 's structural integrity, but it did cause fourteen deaths ( three crewmen and eleven people in the building ) and damage estimated at $1,000,000 ( $13,593,346 in 2017 dollars ). Contents 1 Details 2 See also 3 References 4 External links Details The plane embedded in the side of the building, 1945 On Saturday, July 28, 1945, Lieut. Col. William F. Smith Jr. was piloting a B - 25 Mitchell bomber on a routine personnel transport mission from Bedford Army Air Field to Newark Airport. Smith asked for clearance to land, but was advised of zero visibility. Proceeding anyway, he became disoriented by the fog, and started turning right instead of left after passing the Chrysler Building. At 9 : 40 a.m., the aircraft crashed into the north side of the Empire State Building, between the 78th and 80th floors, carving an 18 - by - 20 - foot ( 5.5 m × 6.1 m ) hole in the building where the offices of the National Catholic Welfare Council were located. One engine shot through the South side opposite the impact and flew as far as the next block, dropping 900 feet ( 270 m ) and landing on the roof of a nearby building and starting a fire that destroyed a penthouse art studio. The other engine and part of the landing gear plummeted down an elevator shaft. The resulting fire was extinguished in 40 minutes. It is still the only significant fire at such a height to be brought under control. Fourteen people were killed : Smith, two enlisted men aboard the bomber ( Staff Sergeant Christopher Domitrovich and Albert Perna, a Navy Aviation Machinist 's Mate, hitching a ride ), and eleven people in the building. The Navy hitchhiker Albert Perna was not found until two days later, when search crews discovered that his body had gone through an elevator shaft and fallen to the bottom. The other two crewmen were burned beyond recognition. Elevator operator Betty Lou Oliver was injured when the cables supporting her elevator sheared and the elevator fell 75 storeys, ending up in the basement. Oliver managed to survive the fall and rescuers later found her amongst the rubble. It still stands as the Guinness World Record for the longest survived elevator fall. Despite the damage and loss of life, the building was open for business on many floors on the following Monday. The crash spurred the passage of the long - pending Federal Tort Claims Act of 1946, as well as the insertion of retroactive provisions into the law, allowing people to sue the government for the accident. See also 1946 40 Wall Street Plane crash El Al Flight 1862 September 11 attacks 2002 Tampa airplane crash 2002 Pirelli Tower airplane crash 2005 Iranian Air Force C - 130 crash 2006 New York City plane crash 2010 Austin suicide attack 2014 Wichita King Air crash Skyscraper fire References ^ Jump up to : `` Empire State Building Withstood Airplane Impact ''. JOM ( monthly publication of The Minerals, Metals & Materials Society ). 2001. Jump up ^ Berman, John S. ( 2003 ). The Empire State Building : The Museum of the City of New York. Barnes, John & Noble Publishing. p. 85. ISBN 978 - 0 - 7607 - 3889 - 4. Jump up ^ Barron, James ( July 28, 1995 ). `` Flaming Horror on the 79th Floor ; 50 Years Ago Today, in the Fog, a Plane Hit the World 's Tallest Building ''. The New York Times. Retrieved November 17, 2012. Jump up ^ Byers, Roland O. ( 1985 ). Flak dodger : a story of the 457th Bombardment Group, 1943 -- 1945, 8th AAF. Pawpaw Press. Jump up ^ Joe Richman ( July 28, 2008 ). `` The Day A Bomber Hit The Empire State Building ''. NPR. ^ Jump up to : `` Longest Fall Survived In An Elevator ''. guinnessworldrecords.com. Archived from the original on March 17, 2006. ^ Jump up to : Molnar, Matt. `` On This Day in Aviation History : July 28th ''. NYCAviation. Retrieved 2009 - 07 - 28. Jump up ^ `` B - 25 Empire State Building Collision ''. Aerospaceweb.org. Retrieved April 8, 2012. Jump up ^ Joe Richman ( July 28, 2008 ). `` The Day A Bomber Hit The Empire State Building ''. NPR. Retrieved July 28, 2008. Eight months after the crash, the U.S. government offered money to families of the victims. Some accepted, but others initiated a lawsuit that resulted in landmark legislation. The Federal Tort Claims Act of 1946, for the first time, gave American citizens the right to sue the federal government. External links On This Day in Aviation History : July 28th -- NYCAviation Plane Hits Empire State Building Bomber Crash into Empire State Building, engineering case study calculating the impact force of the bomber ( Archived from the original on 2004 - 07 - 15. Retrieved 2016 - 06 - 26. ) The short film Stillman Fires Collection : Empire State Building is available for free download at the Internet Archive Empire State Crash Video produced by the PBS Series History Detectives ← 1944 Aviation accidents and incidents in 1945 ( 1945 ) 1946 → Jan 8 Pan Am Flight 161 Jan 31 Australian National Airways Stinson crash Mar 27 Liberator Commando disappearance Apr 23 USAAF Boeing B - 17 Isle of Man crash Jul 12 Eastern Air Lines Flight 45 Jul 28 B - 25 Empire State Building crash Oct 5 Elvetham air crash Oct 5 National Airlines Flight 16 Oct 12 Peip'ing C - 46 crash Nov 3 Honolulu Clipper forced landing Nov 22 Broadway Liberator crash Dec 6 Flight 19 Retrieved from `` https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=1945_Empire_State_Building_B-25_crash&oldid=866242546 '' Categories : Aviation accidents and incidents in New York City Building fires in New York City Aviation accidents and incidents involving fog Aviation accidents and incidents in the United States in 1945 Empire State Building 1945 in New York City Accidents and incidents involving military aircraft 20th century in New York City July 1945 events Talk Contents About Wikipedia Čeština Deutsch Español 한국어 עברית Magyar Português Русский Simple English 中文 4 more Edit links This page was last edited on 29 October 2018, at 04 : 48 ( UTC ). 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Question: when did the plane crash into the empire state building
Answer: July 28, 1945