HERMANTOWN, Minnesota –
Three people aboard a small plane died when it crashed into a house near a northern Minnesota airport, but the two people sleeping inside the house – and their cat – did not were not injured.
Hermantown police say the Cessna 172 plane crashed into the second story of the house just south of the Duluth airport on Saturday, before coming to rest in the backyard.
Jason Hoffman told Minnesota Public Radio that he and his wife slept for just over an hour before the plane crashed through the roof over their bed.
“We could barely see each other through all the insulation dust. I was able to grab a flashlight next to the bed and the first thing I saw was an airplane wheel sitting on the end of our bed,” Hoffman said. “That’s when we looked outside and noticed that the entire back half of our house was gone.”
Hoffman said the wreckage of the plane got stuck between his truck and the garage.
The three people who died on the plane included two men from Burnsville and a woman from St. Paul. They were all in their thirties but were not immediately identified.
The Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board will investigate the crash.