Turkish airliner crashes at Amsterdam airport, 9 dead

A nother plane crash this time in Europe, Netherlands to be precise. Only 9 people dead. Only.

Thats probably hundreds of lives affected by the loss of those 9 people. but still with a 200 ton metal tube filled with 124 people slammes into the ground at 250 mph it's a miracle that anyone gets out.

A Turkish Airlines plane with 134 passengers and crew aboard crashed in light fog while trying to land at Amsterdam's Schiphol airport on Wednesday, killing nine people and injuring dozens.

Officials said some 84 people were taken to hospitals, including 25 who were severely hurt, when flight TK 1951 from Istanbul crashed into a field short of a runway at Schiphol, Europe's fifth-largest airport by passenger volume.

Six were in critical condition.

"We cannot say anything about the cause at the moment," acting local mayor Michel Bezuijen told reporters. "The priority...is providing help and care."

The bodies of three crew members, left in the cockpit amid the plane's wreckage for investigation, were later taken out. Dutch media said the pilot and co-pilot were among the dead.

Officials said they had found the plane's flight data recorder and that it would be analyzed.

Earlier, Dutch officials said 135 people were on board the plane, but that was revised to 134.

Dutch television showed what appeared to be covered bodies on the ground near the crumpled, single-aisle Boeing 737-800.

At least four Americans, who work for the plane's manufacturer Boeing, were on the plane, an official said.

The airliner lay in three parts, with the tail section of the fuselage ripped off, and a wide crack just behind the cockpit. The engines had broken off and no fire was visible.

The plane broke up when it collided with the ground north of a runway at Schiphol, which is 20 km (12 miles) southwest of Amsterdam's center. Survivors were rushed to hospitals in Amsterdam as well as nearby Haarlem and other cities.

"We fell suddenly and stopped," said a passenger who gave only his surname, Mutlucan. "There was a lot of screaming. We crashed and landed in what looked like a field."

"The pilot told us we would be landing in 15 minutes, but seven or eight minutes later we hit the ground."

LIGHT WINDS

Weather reports at the time of the crash indicated decent visibility despite misty conditions, and light winds.

"I thought it was a car collision. We heard a sort of loud and strange sound," eyewitness Randy Cordes, 14, told Reuters. "I saw one engine that was burning but the fire died quickly."

Officials said late on Wednesday they were still trying to confirm passenger identities, which included Dutch, Turkish and U.S. nationals.

A flight from Istanbul carrying relatives of crash victims was to land later on Wednesday.

The Turkish airliner crashed 1 mile short of the "polderbaan" runway, the furthest from terminal buildings, on an approach from the north between Schiphol and Haarlem.

Dutch Transport Minister Camiel Eurlings has said Turkish Airlines met all safety regulations at Schiphol, but added in a statement that the cause of the accident will be investigated.

"The pilot is an experienced one who is a former member of the Turkish Air Force," Turkish Airlines Chief Executive Temel Kotil said.

Wednesday's crash was the 11th accident involving a Turkish Airlines flight in the past 20 years, the NLR Air Traffic Safety Institute in Amsterdam said in a statement.

Turkish Airlines had a troublesome safety record in the 1970s, with 608 lives lost in around two years, but the modern airline's safety record has improved. Wednesday's crash was its second fatal incident this decade, according to the Flight Safety Foundation.

The crash appeared to be the worst at Schiphol since an El Al cargo plane crashed into high-rise apartment blocks in 1992, killing 43 people, 39 of them on the ground.

Octuplet mom fears hospital may not release babies

Octuplet mother Nadya Suleman is making the news again, and frankly I don't know why. This story has been exhausted. What we need is a paternety battle. Who is going to step up to the plate and claim to be the father? At least Dr Phil is on the case.

Nadya Suleman has voiced concern that the hospital where her octuplets are being cared for may prevent her from taking them home when they're healthy enough in coming weeks. But in reality, hospitals don't prevent healthy children from going home — child protective services do.

And that's only if a complaint has been filed. Hospital employees are mandated to report to county authorities any concerns they have about unsuitable home environments, a mother's emotional or psychological instability, or any other situation that could result in harm to a child.

According to talk show host Dr. Phil McGraw, the 33-year-old unemployed mother called him Tuesday and said hospital officials were worried that her current living arrangement wouldn't be suitable.

Stu Riskin, a spokesman for Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services, said the agency cannot comment specifically on Suleman's situation and could not confirm whether a case had been opened on her family.
But in the event a child welfare complaint is made for a baby ready to leave the neo-natal intensive care unit, it's followed by interviews with family and doctors and in-home visits in an effort "to leave no stone unturned so that we can make the best possible assessment," Riskin said.
If a home is determined to be unsuitable, the county first looks to relatives willing to care for the children. If none is found, a foster home is sought, Riskin said.
Suleman gave birth to the octuplets at Kaiser Permanente Bellflower Medical Center on Jan. 26, when they were nine weeks premature. She has six other children, lives in her mother's three-bedroom home in Whittier and has relied on food stamps and disability income to provide for her family.

She expects the children to come home within the next two weeks, she told McGraw in a show that aired Wednesday. Part two of the interview is scheduled to air Thursday.
Kaiser Permanente spokesman Jim Anderson refused to provide details of Suleman's case, citing privacy concerns, and further refused to elaborate on the health provider's normal procedure for discharging neo-natal infants.

But according to experts and information published on the health provider's Web site, typical protocol for babies discharged from NICU is that the hospital's hired social workers and discharge planners work with parents to coordinate the child's return to the home.
"This discharge plan has to account for the fact that these children, because they're small, they might require special consideration," said Lizelda Lopez, spokeswoman for the state's Department of Social Services, which oversees the county-run child welfare programs. "The hospital has to plan for that and has to work with Ms. Suleman."
It is normal for hospitals to provide parents of premature babies with a host of services to prepare them to care for the babies at home, according to Vicki Bermudez, a neo-natal intensive care unit nurse at the Kaiser hospital in Roseville and a California Nurses Association regulatory policy specialist.

That includes environmental assessments and parenting instruction. Home consultations or home visits from nurses are not unusual, Bermudez said.
"This whole issue has been very emotional, and there have been many judgments made by the public. But nurses and doctors aren't there to make judgments," she said. "They just want to make sure the children and family are getting the services they're entitled to and what's in the best interest of those babies."

The babies must be medically stable before they can be released, which means they should be feeding well and able to breathe on their own, though they are sometimes sent home with oxygen or monitoring equipment, said California Nurses Association co-president Geri Jenkins, also a registered nurse.
"The bottom line is they won't be sent home until the medical team is sure — and they're evaluated to make sure — they're strong enough to eat and grow and thrive," Jenkins said.

In a video posted on the celebrity news Web site RadarOnline.com on Wednesday, cameras went from room to room at Suleman's home, showing cramped quarters and clutter.
In the video, Suleman says the home is "obviously too small" but has a large backyard where the children can play. She also says she's looking for a larger home to rent.
"I want the house to be ready, so my whole head is swimming with ideas," Suleman said in the video.

She has not responded to repeated interview requests from The Associated Press. Her phone has been disconnected and though she said on "Dr. Phil" that she has a publicist, the show only identifies him as "Victor" at his request. Efforts to reach him were unsuccessful.

Possible Octuplet Dad Gave Sperm Because He Was in Love With Suleman

Oh oh, Look at me, I want to be famous to, it was me I donated the sperm. I knocked up Chantelle all while dressed as Joaquin Phoenix on steroids.. Fool. Good luck anyway. your on the internet now. Happy?

Denis Beaudoin, the man who says he could be the biological father of Nadya Suleman's octuplets, said he donated his sperm to her three times without asking questions because he was young and in love.

Beaudoin said he thought it was "out of the ordinary" when she asked him to donate. "But I cared about her so much. And I mean, we were, we were in love. I mean, I loved Nadya very much," he told Chris Cuomo in an exclusive interview with "Good Morning America."

Beaudoin said he and Suleman had a "serious" three-year relationship from 1997 to 1999 when he was in his early 20s.

Though he and Suleman never talked about marriage, Beaudoin said when he donated the sperm he thought it would be part of "starting a family" together at some point.

He called Nadya "a really great girl" and thought she would make a good mother. His friends nicknamed her "Giggles" for her laugh.

"She really had a really infectious laugh. You know, just her laugh would, it would make you crack up. It's kind of like she had a real high-pitch, squeaky cartoon voice. And, you know, she was a lot of fun to be around. Just her whole bubbly outward personality was really, really cool," Beaudoin said.

But now Beaudoin said he sees a very different woman, both in appearance and demeanor, than the one he knew.

"She looks different, sounds different. You know, it's just not the Nadya I remember," he said.

Nor did Suleman express a desire to have a lot of children, he said.

With Landmark Trial Half Over, Pirate Bay Crew Celebrates Early Victories

This is an interesting story to anyone who has ever shared a file over the internet. It seems a massive cock-up on the prosecutions side to prepare a trial for three years and after day one of the actual trial drop half of the charges, only realizing now he has not got enough evidence?

Oh well, good luck to the boys anyway.

STOCKHOLM -- As the landmark trial of The Pirate Bay wrapped up its first week Friday, the prosecutor fought to tie the last two defendants to the daily operation of the world's most notorious filesharing site.

Four defendants in all are accused of contributory copyright infringement for allegedly deliberately facilitating the making available of copyrighted works to the public. Establishing intent is crucial for a crime to have been committed under Swedish law, and the prosecutor and civil plaintiffs have tried to show that the overriding purpose of The Pirate Bay is to encourage unlawful sharing of copyrighted material.

With the Pirate Bay trial half over, the defendants have reason to be hopeful. First, the government stunned observers on Tuesday by dropping half the charges in the joint criminal-civil prosecution, resulting in a partial acquittal. And despite aggressive questioning by the prosecutor and a battery of entertainment industry lawyers, defendants Gottfrid Svartholm Warg and Fredrik Neij stuck to the story that the sole purpose of The Pirate Bay is to let internet users transmit whatever material they want.

Warg and Neij were never public people, and that showed in their sometimes awkward testimony. But Friday's first witness, Peter Sunde, aka Brokep, is The Pirate Bay's official spokesman, and he's accustomed to the spotlight. He wore a grey hoodie as he took the stand to defend the website, even as he sought to distance himself from its operations.

The first questions posed to Sunde by prosecutor Hakan Roswall focused on his ideology, prompting Pirate Bay supporters in the blogosphere to cry foul. Referring to the open-culture activist organization that founded The Pirate Bay the prosecutor asked: "Is it correct that the Pirate Bureau discusses copyright and is critical of copyright as it is today?"

"What is your personal opinion on copyright?" the prosecutor followed up.

When recording industry lawyer Peter Danowsky asked the same question later, Sunde fired back. "That is a political question," Sunde said. "Is this a political trial or a legal trial?"

Danowsky's answer: "In what way is copyright a political question?"

Danowsky then produced printouts of news articles on The Pirate Bay, pointing out statements made by Sunde. One exhibit came from a 2006 Wired.com article, from which Danowsky read the last paragraph aloud: "We're also into educating people about the consequences of piracy. We're teaching them how to do it."

Sunde said that he meant that The Pirate Bay educates people about filesharing in general. He quoted the paragraph before to show that his statement was a response to MPAA, which claimed that it was "educating people about the consequences of piracy and getting involved."

Likeable with a boyish face, Sunde can argue with die-hard enemies on TV and still carry a winning smile while his opponent resorts to cursing. He testified Friday that he was "only" a media contact for the website, and that he never actively participated in the acts charged by the prosecutor --namely, "organizing, systematizing, programming, financing or running " Pirate Bay. But Danowsky confronted Sunde with e-mail printouts taken in the 2006 police raid, which seemed to show that Sunde was more involved than he's acknowledged.

Carl Lundström, a wealthy 48-year old businessman, has a far more tenuous connection to the site, and he did not face any ideological questions on the stand. The prosecutor tried to tie Lundström to The Pirate Bay as a "co-owner," but Lundström claimed that he has only sold hosting and internet services to the site's operators.

Fredrik Neij, one of the young defendants, was hired by Lundström's CTO as a network technician in 2004, while Neij was already running the then-tiny filesharing site.

Lundström admitted giving The Pirate Bay's crew moral support and sympathy, but said he'd rejected becoming a business partner with them, finding the prospect too legally risky. "I didn't want to get into potential illegal things when I had 50 employees," he stated.

The court adjourned for the weekend, with testimony set to resume Tuesday afternoon. Among the scheduled witnesses is John Kennedy, the chairman of the International Federation of Phonographic Industries - the international version of the RIAA. The trial is expected to wrap up at the end of next week. The three civilian law judges, and a fourth professional judge, will decide the defendants' guilt or innocence by a majority vote. In the event of a tie, the professional judge's vote will prevail.

Friday night, Sunde will play DJ at a party arranged by the Pirate Bureau. Stockholm's digerati are expected to turn up to show support for The Pirate Bay.

Arrest Near In Chandra Levy Case?

This is an old one, I had completely forgot this one... nice to see that the police seem to be doing their job. Nice for Chandras family aswell I guess.

Reports: D.C. Police Eyeing Inmate In 2001 Murder Of Washington Intern

Authorities in Washington, D.C. may be close to an arrest in the murder of former government intern Chandra Levy, a case that made headlines, and brought down a congressman eight years ago.

There are reports that D.C. police have submitted evidence to the U.S. Attorney's Office in an effort to get an arrest warrant for a man identified as Ingmar Guandique.

He's behind bars, convicted of assaulting two women jogging in Washington's Rock Creek Park.

An inmate serving time with Guandique reportedly told investigators that Guandique told him he killed Levy, but Guandique is said to have told police he saw Levy in the park, but didn't harm her.

Levy was an intern at the Federal Bureau of Prisons.

She was 24 when she disappeared from her D.C. apartment. Her remains were found more than a year later in Rock Creek Park by a man walking his dog.

D.C. cops were sharply criticized at the time for saying they'd searched that park, and found nothing.

Levy's disappearance has remained a mystery ever since, but it also revealed an affair with then-California Rep. Gary Condit. That cost him his seat.

For many weeks, Condit appeared to be the prime suspect in her disappearance. For months, he said little about his relationship with Levy, except for repeating over and over that he had nothing to do with her death or disappearance.

On The Early Show Saturday Edition, CBS News legal analyst Lisa Bloom speculated a jailhouse snitch, like the one cited in news accounts, could have been the source of the new evidence police are apparently using to target Guandique.

"My guess would be two things," Bloom said. "One, new statements from the suspect behind bars, possibly linking him to Chandra Levy. The other would be developments in forensic science, which has grown by leaps and bounds in the last eight years. Maybe they have something new on him ... something linking him to the remains of Chandra Levy. When her remains were found in Rock Creek Park, they were highly decomposed. ... Nevertheless, hair, bone samples, dental records, something linking him to her remains. Otherwise, it's hard to understand what could be new -- statements perhaps made behind bars to other inmates, a jailhouse confession, something of that nature."

New York Post Chimp Cartoon Racist or Not?

Im going to have to side with the New York post on this one: With all the hassle of going back and forth amending and re-amending you would think they had a team of monkeys employed on the hill figuring this all out. There in lies the joke.

That Barack Obama happens to be an African American and that racists have likend them to monkeys is in this case irrelevant. It would be ok to ridicule George Bush, because he is just an idiot. Easy target - George, you monkey!

We still need to be able to be satirical about our government, race, religion or species.

A cartoon likening the author of the stimulus bill, perhaps President Barack Obama, with a rabid chimpanzee graced the pages of the New York Post on Wednesday.

The drawing, from famed cartoonist Sean Delonas, is rife with violent imagery and racial undertones. In it, two befuddled-looking police officers holding guns look over the dead and bleeding chimpanzee that attacked a woman in Stamford, Connecticut.

"They'll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill," reads the caption.

An email to Delonas and a call to the New York Post went unreturned. The cartoon appears both on the New York Post website and page 12 of the Wednesday paper.

At its most benign, the cartoon suggests that the stimulus bill was so bad, monkeys may as well have written it. Others believe it compares the president to a rabid chimp. Either way, the incorporation of violence and (on a darker level) race into politics is bound to be controversial. Perhaps that's what Delonas wanted.

Rev. Al Sharpton has weighed in on the cartoon in a statement:
"The cartoon in today's New York Post is troubling at best given the historic racist attacks of African-Americans as being synonymous with monkeys. One has to question whether the cartoonist is making a less than casual reference to this when in the cartoon they have police saying after shooting a chimpanzee that "Now they will have to find someone else to write the stimulus bill."

"Being that the stimulus bill has been the first legislative victory of President Barack Obama (the first African American president) and has become synonymous with him it is not a reach to wonder are they inferring that a monkey wrote the last bill?"

Woman mauled by pet chimp Travis in critical condition after surgery at Conn. hospital

This is truly scary - have they not seen the film Link? Everyone knows that chimpanzees can be vicious animals. It sure does bring into focus the laws (or lack of) that allows individuals to keepp these beasts in thier homes. And in this case the ape had escaped and caused mayhem on previous occasions. Why where they allowed to keep it? It is a wild animal.

The Connecticut woman brutally mauled by a gigantic pet ape remained in critical condition Tuesday, officials said.

Charla Nash, 55, suffered massive injuries to her face and hands after her friend's 200-pound chimp, Travis, suddenly pounced on her Monday.

Nash had surgery last night at Stamford Hospital and was doing "okay," her sister-in-law, Kate Nash said.

Nash suffered what Stamford Mayor Daniel Malloy described as "life-changing, if not life-threatening injuries" after Travis got his hands on house keys and escaped from his home.

Travis attacked Nash as soon as she got out of her car to try to help his owner, Sandy Herold, get the ape back in his cage, said Stamford, Conn., police Capt. Rich Conklin.

Herold, stabbed Travis with a butcher knife and struck him with a shovel in a bid to end his rampage, police said.

But the normally docile chimp, who starred in a TV commercial for Old Navy cargo shorts and enjoyed human activities like drinking wine and surfing the Internet, could not be stopped.
When cops drove up around 4 p.m., the burly ape tore off a cruiser's side mirror and opened the door.

The officers had "nowhere to retreat," Conklin said, and shot him several times.

Bleeding from stab wounds and gunshots, 15-year-old Travis staggered down the driveway and into Herold's house, where he collapsed and died in a zoolike cage the size of a room.

Conklin said it wasn't clear what set the chimp off, but theorized Travis' bout with Lyme disease - which can cause panic attacks, paranoia, personality changes and mood swings in people - could be connected. Travis was taking medication for the disease, Conklin said.

"These actions have not been seen in the chimpanzee before. This animal had been raised as a member of the family," Conklin said.

Herold, 70, had given the pyscho simian tea with Xanax to calm him down just before Nash arrived, cops said, and called 911 as the chimp mauled her friend.

A 911 dispatcher could hear the animal screaming in the background as he ripped into the victim.
Herold told cops that Travis may not have recognized Charla Nash because she wore her normally long, flowing hair up Monday.

Herold and her husband, Jerome, who treated Travis almost like a child after the death of their daughter more than a decade ago, were distraught.

Conklin said the couple had owned Travis for close to 14 years.

Herold's friend Lynn Mecca said Travis had known Charla Nash for years.
"I don't know why he would do that," she said.

But Mecca's ex-husband Don Mecca said the ape had a mean streak and often was aggressive. He said he had warned Nash to be careful around Travis. "I told her, 'Charla, don't get close to that monkey when he is not in that cage,'" Mecca said.

Nash's brother Steve said his sister was aware Travis could be moody.
Travis was known to the town cops because they worked with the Herolds' towing company, Desire Me Towing. He would ride in the trucks, waving.

When the Herolds' daughter was killed in a car crash, the ape appeared to mourn, holding her photo sadly, they told the paper.

In October 2003, the chimp made headlines when he jumped out of his owners' SUV and commandeered a major intersection, holding cops at bay for two hours.

Travis had been in the vehicle when it stopped at a light, and someone in the next vehicle threw something at him, hitting him through an open window.

He unbuckled his seat belt and jumped out of the vehicle, wanting to play.
Cops arrived in a dozen cruisers but could not corral Travis, who was capering in the street, occasionally rolling on his back and charging at officers.

Officers, who had no tranquilizer gun, tried using cookies, macadamia nuts and ice cream to lure Travis into a cruiser. Nothing worked until he tired and got back into the Herolds' SUV.

No charges were filed in that case. It is not illegal to own an exotic pet in Connecticut.
"That was more mischievous than vicious," Conklin said. "It became something of a legend."
Travis was also something of a celebrity in his younger days.

He co-starred with Morgan Fairchild in an Old Navy ad, filmed a TV pilot and appeared on "The Maury Povich Show."

"Our closest relatives, we would like to think they can be domesticated," Malloy said Monday night.
"Unfortunately, this is not always the case."

Bristol Palin Interview: Hardly the Typical Teen Pregnancy Hardship Story

Boohoo.. This is a good article though, read it. Poor little Bristol should read up on little Alfie Patten for advice on teen pregnancies, or not. And 50 out of 1000 births is not considerd low in europe where the UK has one of the highest with 28 and low and behold Sweden, one of the most unreligious (and therefore imoral) countrys in the world has 7 teen pregnancys per 1000 births.
In fact the US has one of the highest in the developed world. Why

The New York Times blog, the Caucus, noted today that Bristol Palin sat for her "first interview since giving birth to Tripp" last night when she went on the air with FOX's Greta Sustern. Bristol Palin is the 18 year old daughter of former vice presidential candidate and Alaska governor Sarah Palin. Sarah Palin created a public stir when she announced during the presidential campaign that her teen daughter was pregnant.

But back to the Bristol Palin interview. First interview? Since when do we expect teens whose only public "accomplishment" is becoming pregnant out of wedlock and giving birth to give series of interviews? Do we expect that teens like Bristol Palin who make the mistake of unintentionally becoming pregnant become some sort of instant experts on teen pregnancy?

Other than the tabloid factor, why should anyone care what this one particular teenage mom says about teen pregnancy? Bristol Palin is one of hundreds of thousands of teens who experience teen pregnancy each year. Is there anything that makes her story compelling?

And what sort of expert is Bristol Palin on the occurrence of teen pregnancy? In her interview with van Sustern, Bristol Palin says abstinence is the best policy but it's not realistic. When pressed for a reason, Palin finally said that it [having sex] is so accepted now.

Perhaps Bristol Palin did not get the word that teen pregnancy is in fact near a historic low although it did increase slightly in 2006. According to the Centers for Disease Control, of the 41.9 live births per 1000 women ages 15-19 in 2006 (435.427 total), 80% were unintended.

Is Bristol Palin even close to typical? No. The typical pregnant teen- unlike Bristol Palin- receives minimal prenatal care. The typical pregnant teen- unlike Bristol Palin whose mother is a governor- lives in poverty. And Bristol Palin has a large network of extended relatives to help her care for her baby so she can continue her schooling, unlike the average pregnant teen who drops out of school. Smoking, low birthweight, these are issues associated with teen pregnancy- issues off Bristol Palin's radar.

Bristol Palin may be losing some sleep and be adjusting to her new identity as mom first, teen second, but she is hardly the face of teen pregnancy in America.

The Bristol Palin interview added nothing to the national discussion of causes or prevention of teen pregnancy. Greta van Sustern of FOX may believe she attained a quasi celebrity coup by interviewing Bristol Palin, but if she wanted to know the true hardship of teen pregnancy, she should have chosen a more typical pregnant teen to interview.

NTSB: Plane didn't dive, but landed flat on house

CLARENCE, N.Y. – An investigator says the plane that crashed on a house in New York state landed flat on it and was pointed away from the airport where it was supposed to land.

Steve Chealander (CHEE-lan-duhr) said Saturday that Continental Connection Flight 3407 did not dive into the house, as initially thought.

Chealander says the New Jersey-to-Buffalo flight was cleared to land on a runway pointing to the southwest. But the plane crashed with its nose pointed to the northeast.

He also says the catastrophic nature of the crash means it could take three or four days to remove human remains.

Forty-nine people on the plane and one person in the house died in the fiery crash late Thursday.

Crash investigators picked through incinerated wreckage Saturday, gathering evidence to determine what brought down a commuter plane that plunged into a home and exploded.

It could take days to recover all human remains from the plot of land where a single-family home stood before Continental Connection Flight 3407 nose-dived into it late Thursday, National Transportation Safety Board spokesman Steve Chealander said.

Experts were analyzing data from the black boxes, including statements by crew members about a buildup of ice on the wings and windshield of the plane, Chealander said.

But authorities have yet to pin that as the cause of the crash, which occurred during a light snow and mist, killing 49 people on the flight and one man in the home.

Ice on wings can cripple an aircraft and has been blamed for several previous plane crashes. Other aircraft in the area Thursday night told air traffic controllers it also experienced icing around the time that Flight 3407 from Newark, N.J., to Buffalo went down.

Icing is one of several elements being examined by investigators, who plan to remain in Buffalo for another week before shipping plane parts to locations around the country for study, Chealander said. A full report will likely take a year, he said.

"We're in the very early stages of the investigation," he said. "The icing and other things are just preliminary focuses."

One aspect of the investigation will focus on the crew, how they were trained and whether they had enough time to rest between flights. Other investigators focused on the weather, the mechanics of the plane and whether the engine, wings and various mechanics of the plane operated as they were designed to.

But recovery of the bodies will take priority over the investigation, Chealander said.

The remains-recovery effort was being led by Dennis Dirkmaat, a forensic anthropologist from Mercyhurst College in Erie, Pa., and a nationally renowned expert who led the recovery effort after United Flight 93 crashed in Shanksville, Pa., on Sept. 11, 2001.

The crash site remained off limits Saturday, with police barring reporters and photographers from the neighborhood.

Authorities still haven't released a list of the victims of the nation's first deadly air crash in 2 1/2 years, but reminders of the disaster were visible all around the Buffalo area.

Flags flew at half-staff outside Buffalo Niagara International Airport and at Clarence Town Hall, the site of a command center set up by police.

Family members of the victims were sequestered in a hotel Saturday where they were scheduled to meet with representatives of Continental Airlines. Police turned away reporters.

The 74-seat Q400 Bombardier aircraft was operated by Colgan Air, based in Manassas, Va. Colgan's parent company is Pinnacle Airlines of Memphis, Tenn.

Beverly Eckert, a 9/11 widow and activist, among those killed in plane crash

This story is just sickening, after going through all that and pulling yourself up, just to be killed in a plane crash. Two members of the same family killed by an airplane. What are the odds? Your probably more likely to get hit by a defunct out of control, russian communications satellite.

Eckert, whose husband was in the World Trade Center on 9/11, was flying to Buffalo to launch a scholarship in his memory. She had met with President Obama last week to discuss anti-terror measures.

Last week, Beverly Eckert was at the White House to talk with President Barack Obama about how the new administration could deal with those suspected of terrorism.

This morning, Eckert, the widow of a man who died in the Sept. 11 attack on the World Trade Center, was among the 50 people killed when a commuter plane crashed outside Buffalo, N.Y.


"Beverly was gentle, loving and fragile," said Christy Ferer, another 9/11 widow who knew Eckert. "She was still in pain from her 9/11 loss and consequently pulled back a bit from her 9/11 activities. She was loved and respected by so many."

Eckert's husband, Sean worked at Aon Corp., a risk management firm, on the 98th floor of the World Trade Center's south tower. She often cried when she told how Sean, her high school sweetheart, telephoned her on the morning of the attacks, said he loved her. A loud explosion then silence ended the call.

She was on Continental Connection Flight 3407 to Buffalo to mark her husband's 58th birthday and to launch a scholarship in his memory, President Obama said this morning.

"Tragic events such as these remind us of the fragility of life and the value of every single day," Obama said in televised remarks to the Business Council.

"One person who understood that well was Beverly Eckert, who was on that flight and who I met with just a few days ago. You see, Beverly lost her husband on 9/11 and became a tireless advocate for those families whose lives were forever changed on that September day.

"I pray that her family finds peace and comfort in the hard days ahead," the president said.

Eckert was among the group of relatives of those who died in the terror attacks who worked to make Congress more responsive to the threat from terrorism. The group's work helped push the 2004 reform of the U.S. intelligence system.

When it was over and they'd won passage of the intelligence reform law, Eckert said she would end her high-profile role to return to a quieter life.

"I did all of this for Sean's memory, I did it for him," she said. "I just wanted Sean to come home from work. Maybe now, someone else's Sean will get to come home."

Airliner crashes into home in upstate NY, killing 49 people

Where these Dash-8 planes not i some kind of trouble last year with scandinavian airlines, where Bombardier had to fork out loads of compensation for faulty construction or something - any airplane buffs out there who can tell me more? Who's ever fault it was it's still a tradgedy though.

A Continental Express flight from Newark to Buffalo crashed into a home 4 to 6 miles from Buffalo Niagara International Airport on Thursday night, killing 49 people, officials said.

The plane carried 44 passengers and a crew of four, according to the Federal Aviation Administration. Ted Lopatkiewicz, a spokesman for the National Transportation Safety Board, said at midnight that he did not know if there were any survivors on the plane. The Erie County executive, Chris Collins, later said at a news conference that 49 people were killed, including one on the ground.

Collins said the plane, Continental Airlines Flight 3407, crashed about 10:20 p.m., five minutes before it was due to land. The house it crashed into was still engulfed in flames at 12:30 a.m., and Collins said that about 12 houses were evacuated and a limited state of emergency was declared.

Trooper John Manthey of the New York State Police said the plane went down in the hamlet of Clarence Center.

"It was just like a huge, great big crash, a boom," said Sandra Baker, who lives two blocks from the crash site on Railroad Street.

Both of her sons, volunteer firefighters, were at the scene.

"There was this banging sound" before the crash, she said. Then, she said, there was a boom, then a dark cloud and flames and the acrid smell of fuel and fire wafting through the air.

She said she believed the two people who lived in the home where the plane crashed made it out safely, but she was not sure; she did not know them personally, but said people had seen them watching their home burn with their neighbors.

Another woman who lives nearby described the sound before the crash as "a loud roar over my house."

"It was like the whole house shook," said the woman, Jennifer Clark, who also lives on Railroad Street. "Then there was silence."

Clark said she looked out of her window and saw a ball of flames rising into the sky.

She woke up her husband and said, "I think a plane just crashed."

Baker described the town as "small town U.S.A.," a place that will reel from what she was sure would be the biggest tragedy the town has ever seen.

The plane went down in light snow, Lopatkiewicz said.

A joint investigation was being conducted by the New York State Police, the Erie County Sheriff's Office and the Niagara Frontier Transportation Authority. A safety board team of investigators will arrive in Buffalo this morning, he said.

The plane was a De Havilland DHC-8-400 Dash 8, a 74-seat, twin-engine turboprop, operated by Colgan Airways, a feeder airline for Continental.

Colgan also flies as a feeder for US Airways and United Airlines. Colgan's Web site said the airline operates 51 turboprops, including the Q400, which is a newer version of the Dash 8.

The last fatal crash involving a scheduled carrier in the United States was a ComAir regional jet in Lexington, Ky., in August 2006. The crew picked a too-short runway for takeoff; 47 passengers and two of the three crew members were killed.