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Small plane crashes into mobile home park in Colorado mountain town, killing 2 onboard
A small plane crashed into a mobile home park in the Colorado mountain town of Steamboat Springs on Monday and the crash killed the two onboard occupants. That’s according to the Routt County Coroner’s Office, which said the victims were a man and a woman. Officials with Steamboat Springs Fire Rescue said no one in the mobile park was killed.
The twin-engine Cessna 421 hit two mobile homes at 4:23 p.m. and started a fire in the small Routt County community that also spread to outbuildings.
Gabriel T. Rogers
After the plane hit, people in West Acres trailer park scrambled to get away from the smoke and flames.
Two kids who live in the neighborhood shared what they saw in the first frightening moments after the plane came down.
“I just heard this explosion. And went outside and I saw flames,” said Jose Alegria.
“And I just hear boom. Everything around us just shakes and there’s screaming. There’s people screaming,” said Beyonce Alegria.
Then others rushed in to try and help. Jae Seifert and his friend Mike McGlone drove up to the park fearing the plane had come down in another nearby neighborhood where McGlone’s children live. They were among those trying to find out if people were trapped in their homes.
“People were coming out of their houses with fire extinguishers, buckets of water and stuff. I think trying to help,” said Seifert. “We ran up to the two doors of the units of the mobile homes that were on fire, tried to scream inside, seeing if anybody was in there, any pets, anything like that. And tried until we couldn’t stand the heat anymore.”
The fire was just too intense.
“It was too flamed and too hot within fifty feet of any of those structures to get any closer,” said McGlone.
Police in Steamboat Springs established a call line for concerned family members who were unsure about if their relatives were safe, but after a few hours they said everyone who lives in the mobile home park is accounted for.
The National Transportation Safety Board said they will investigate the crash. According to FlightAware, the plane left from Ogden, Utah, and then landed at Vance Brand Airport in Longmont, Colorado. It then left from Longmont and was en route to Steamboat Springs when it crashed.
“We both just looked up and there was a plane in a flat spin,” said Seifert, who was visiting McGlone at Westside Auto, when they spotted the plane in trouble.
“I heard it before it came into sight,” said McGlone. “It was spinning full circles and one of the engines was definitely out.”
Steamboat Springs Fire Rescue
“So essentially the plane was not really making a real lot of forward momentum but was basically rotating 360 degrees. Almost stationary, which was pretty bizarre,” Seifert said.
The Routt County Office of Emergency Management is helping residents of the park who are impacted by the crash.
Steamboat Springs Fire Rescue
West Acres trailer park is located near the Steamboat Springs Airport. The airport is located a little over 2 miles to the northwest of the ski town’s downtown area. It only services private operations. Commercial flights land at the Yampa Valley Regional Airport, which is 28 miles west of downtown.
This is at least the third small plane crash in Colorado this month. On Sunday, a plane attempted to make an emergency landing on Interstate 25 and crashed near a creekbed in the Larskspur area. And a crash in Arvada on June 7 killed a mother who was aboard a plane when it landed in someone’s front yard.
President Biden has given the OK to lift restrictions that will allow Ukraine to use U.S.-provided long-range weapons to strike deep into Russian territory, a U.S. official confirmed to CBS News on Sunday. The move is a significant change to U.S. policy in the ongoing Ukraine-Russia conflict.
The easing of restrictions would allow Kyiv to use the Army Tactical Missile System, or ATACMS, to hit targets inside Russia. The move also comes as some 10,000 North Korean troops were sent to Kursk near Ukraine’s northern border to help Russian forces retake territory.
The White House National Security Council declined to comment to CBS News.
The U.S. decision could help Ukraine at a moment when Russian forces appear to be making gains and could put Kyiv in a better negotiating position when and if peace talks happen.
It also comes as Mr. Biden is about to leave office and President-elect Trump has pledged to limit American support for Ukraine and ending the war as soon as possible.
In an interview with Ukrainian media outlet Suspilne on Friday, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Kyiv would like to end the war with Russia next year through “diplomatic means.”
He said he is certain that the war will end “sooner” than it otherwise would have once Mr. Trump becomes president.
“It is certain that the war will end sooner with the policies of the team that will now lead the White House. This is their approach, their promise to their citizens,” Zelenskyy said.
February 2025 would mark the third year of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine with Russia’s troops gaining ground in recent months.
For several months, Zelenskyy and many of his Western supporters have been requesting to use U.S. weapons to hit Russian military targets far from its border, saying the U.S. ban had made it impossible for Ukraine to try to stop Russian attacks on its cities and electrical grids.
Some congressional Republicans have urged Mr. Biden to loosen the rules on how Ukraine can use U.S.-provided weapons.
contributed to this report.
CBS News
Ohio governor, other leaders condemn neo-Nazi march in Columbus: “Your hate isn’t welcome in our city”
Leaders in Ohio condemned a group of neo-Nazis parading around part of Columbus carrying flags with swastikas on Saturday afternoon.
Columbus public safety dispatchers told CBS affiliate WBNS on Saturday that they received multiple 911 calls around 1:30 p.m. about a group of individuals marching in the city’s Short North.
Video sent to the station showed nearly a dozen people wearing black pants, shirts and head coverings and red masks covering their mouths marching down the street. Three of the people were carrying black flags with red swastikas.
It was not immediately clear who was in the group.
Hours after the incident, Mayor Andrew Ginther released a statement saying the city rejects the “cowardly display” and that it “stands squarely against hatred and bigotry.”
“We will not allow any of our neighbors to be intimidated, threatened or harmed because of who they are, how they worship and whom they love,” Ginther said in his statement shared on X.
The city’s attorney, Zach Klein, said in a statement on X that those involved in the neo-Nazi march should “take your flags and the masks you hide behind and go home and never come back. Your hate isn’t welcome in our city.”
“This is not who we are, and we will not tolerate or normalize this disgusting ideology in any form,” he added.
Gov. Mike DeWine said in his own statement that the people involved in the incident were “spewing vile and racist speech against people of color and Jews.”
“There is no place in this State for hate, bigotry, antisemitism or violence, and we must denounce it wherever we see it,” he said.
Columbus Division of Police Sgt. Joseph Albert told WNBS that there were no arrests made, although he noted that many of the individuals were detained but later released.
Columbus, Ohio’s largest city, is located roughly 45 minutes from Springfield, where the Columbus Dispatch reported that neo-Nazis marched through the streets this summer as the city became the focal point of false claims about Haitian immigrants in the presidential election.
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