BAYONNE -- In the minutes after a small plane crashed in a residential neighborhood, there was panic and worry.

Those fears quickly turned into a phrase repeated by city officials, residents, and witnesses: "thank God."

Despite multiple power lines being knocked out and several cars heavily damaged, no one was seriously injured and there was no structural damage.

It would have been a different story if the plane crashed just seconds earlier.

Faisal Noor was working at the Shell gas station on the corner of Avenue E and 40th Street. He was standing at pump number two when he noticed the Piper PA-28 aircraft inching towards the ground.

Debris from a plane crash lands in a Bayonne gas station. Caitlin Mota | The Jersey Journal  

He ran left towards the station's convenience store, then right when piece of the

"My heart," Noor recalled. "It stopped."plane bounced off the storefront's glass window.

The piece of the plane - about 3 feet long - narrowly missed a gas pump. The plane flew just feet above the gas station's overpass.

Bayonne Police Lt. James Donovan identified the pilot as 56-year-old George Pettway, of Long Island. 

City officials said during a brief press conference that Pettway encountered a problem near the State of Liberty and he appeared to be planning an emergency landing. Pettway was alert and conscious after the crash and was listed in stable condition at Jersey City Medical Center, hospital spokesman Mark Rabson said.

"Thank God for him and his family," Mayor Jimmy Davis said at the scene. "For us, thank god for him landing on the ground and no one is hurt. All we have is damage." 

The crash was so powerful, a parked car was pushed several feet from the curb to the middle of the roadway.

"I can't believe it," said the car's owner Rose Palmisano. "We're just grateful no one was in the car."

Bayonne Fire Chief Keith Weaver said the plane was upside down and mangled when the department arrived on scene. He credited his firefighters for doing an "excellent job" extricating the pilot. 

There was no fire when the plane came to a rest. The plane, which Noor said bounced of a telephone pole before crashing, could have started an inferno had it landed in the gas station. 

The Federal Aviation Administration was on the scene of the crash Sunday afternoon. A spokesman for the agency is investigating, but said the National Transportation Safety Board will determine the probably cause of the crash. 

A spokesperson for the NTSB said they are still gathering information from the FAA and additional information is expected to be released on Monday. 

Several residents are still without power. Crews removed three damaged cars from the scene at about 2:45 p.m. before lifting the small aircraft onto a flatbed truck to be towed to a city garage. 

 The gas attendant said the crash could have been a lot worse had it not been a weekend.  

"Today it's a Sunday, not a lot of people," Noor said. "Another day of the week it would be different." 

Caitlin Mota may be reached at cmota@jjournal.com. Follow her on Twitter @caitlin_mota. Find The Jersey Journal on Facebook.

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