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I live a block from a house that got hit by a single engine airplane yesterday morning at 5:17. So you can guess where I was (in my bathrobe and bunny-slippers) <atsa lie - I don't gots no bunny slippers.... but I WAS in my robe> after I recovered from the initial shock of hearing what turned out to be 7, count 'em, SEVEN helicopters hovering over my head at near ground level. They only SOUNDED like 10,000 power lawn mowers all running in unison!! AAAAAARGH! JEEEEZ! I had been sound asleep and suddenly there was this awful NOISE! I thought it was another major earthquake, like the Northridge Quake that struck so near my home in '94 (HEAVEN FORBID!!), but it turned out to be the coptors. Gotta tell ya tho, initially - till I could see for m'self that it wasn't a quake or the end of the world, I was one mighty scared person!! Once I found out what had happened, I didn't linger outside - it was drizzling and chilly and I was very tired. With all the police and fire personnel, news media and lookee-loos standing about, I saw no reason to just hang 'round, so I walked back home, wondering at the luck of the 2 older occupants (husband and wife) of the house who'd JUST installed an all-steel emergency ladder LAST SUNDAY on their bedroom balcony. THAT saved their lives as the stairwell was engulfed in flames when the plane exploded. Unfortunately the two occupants of the plane died. I got home and HECK... it was STILL a godawful-early hour of the morning - just six. Due to the noise of the still-hovering helicopters, I couldn't even turn back in for some more shuteye. And oddly, when I watched the news last nite and saw a video recounting of the day's happenings on TV, I was VERY surprised to find that not even ONE on site interviewer had said something to the couple whose home had been hit and set afire by an plane like "So how do you feel, Mrs. Peiman, about not getting killed when a plane crashed into your newly remodeled home?" From the careful LACK of the usual thoughtless, callous comments that always seem to be the only way tragic events are handled by the news media, there's no question in my mind that there'd been some sensitivity training - or one HELLUVA of an editing job had been done to remove that type of commentary! Today there's almost a surrealistic feeling about the entire event.. and it almost seems like it was a figment of my imagination. A quick drive-by proved that it was NOT that. Barb Mallut [log in to unmask]