United flight 826, Brooklyn, NY, 1960 - Plane Crash Sites on Waymarking.com

On Dec. 16, 1960, United flight 826 and TWA flight 266 collided over Staten Island. The TWA aircraft fell apart and its parts and passengers fell onto Staten Island; the United aircraft crashed into buildings at the intersection of 7th Avenue and Sterling Place in the Park Slope section of Brooklyn.

All but one of the passengers died before or during the crash; several people on the ground were also killed. The surviving passenger, a boy, Stephen Baltz, lived only one day and died at nearby Methodist Hospital.

Sir Edmund Hillary, one of the two men who in 1953 had become the first humans to climb Mt. Everest, had been booked for the flight but missed the plane in Chicago.

There is currently no memorial to the victims at the crash site, although there is one at Brooklyn's Green-Wood Cemetery. The chapel at Methodist Hospital includes a plaque in memory of Stephen Baltz, displaying the coins he had in his pocket at the time of the crash.

The north corner of the intersection stood empty for many years, but nearly 50 years later, a new condominium building was constructed. The address is 133 Sterling Place.

The block of Sterling Place containing the crash site is now named "Ed Rogowsky Way." Rogowsky (1940-2001) (http://heresparkslope.blogspot.com/2009/03/whos-ed-rogowsky.html), who had nothing to do with the crash, was a professor of political science at Brooklyn College, and was involved in city planning, in providing educational opportunities for workers, and in protecting the rights of gay people; in the 1990s he hosted a local public-affairs TV show.

Web Address for Related Web Sites: [Web Link] Date of Crash: 12/16/1960 Aircraft Model: DC-8 Military or Civilian: Civilian Cause of Crash: Midair collision with another passenger plane. Tail Number: Not listed

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