JAMES W. ANNESS / THE RECORD Emergency personnel surrounding the plane at Teterboro Airport. The 65-year-old pilot was pulled to safety by a policeman and an airport official.

A TIMELINE OF INCIDENTS
TETERBORO'S RICH HISTORY

A real estate developer returning from Nantucket crashed his plane just short of a Teterboro Airport runway Tuesday, bringing to three the number of accidents at the airport this year and stoking fears of a potential disaster.

Dominick Alfieri, 65, was reported in fair condition at Hackensack University Medical Center after a Port Authority officer and an airport official pulled him from his burning eight-seat turboprop.

Although airport and federal aviation officials would not give the pilot's name, a source close to the incident confirmed it was Alfieri, president of a major development company whose corporate buildings include the Metropark campus in Edison.

"He's been flying from Nantucket to New Jersey for 30 years," said son-in-law Michael Joseph. "I've been on that plane hundreds of times."

Teterboro's air traffic control tower was first notified of trouble around 11:30 a.m., said Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Jim Peters. The pilot of the twin-engine plane alerted the tower of engine problems.

The craft was cleared for landing on Teterboro's Runway 1, a 7,000-foot stretch that begins just north of Redneck Avenue in Moonachie. Rescue crews were summoned to the runway.

Approaching from the northwest, Alfieri had to make a left turn into the path of the runway.

But witnesses said the Swearingen SA-226T appeared to turn too far.

First, the plane banked sharply to the left, then the pilot apparently tried to turn it clockwise to level out, said Tom VanTine, a tow truck operator who was washing his rig on Moonachie Avenue as the plane passed overhead.

"It just dove - it just dove right into the ground," VanTine said. "All we heard was pop-pop, like two shotguns. And then dead silence."

Another witness, Bill Stevick, said the right wing "dipped and caught the edge of the runway" as the plane came in, "and the plane ended up on fire."

FAA officials said the left wing hit the ground first.

As firefighters doused the burning plane with fire-suppressing foam, Port Authority police Officer Mike Wohn and Marcello Morelli, Teterboro Airport's assistant operations manager, noticed Alfieri trying to climb out of an emergency exit. The men said they pulled Alfieri out.

Port Authority officials shut down the airport for several hours after the crash. It reopened in time for the late afternoon rush.

National Transportation Safety Board investigators began looking for clues to what caused the crash, an agency spokesman said.

This is the third time this year that NTSB investigators have been summoned to an accident scene at the busy general aviation airport. Tuesday's incident also provided more fodder for critics who contend the airport has outgrown the densely populated communities surrounding it.

In February, a chartered corporate jet failed to take off from another Teterboro runway, barreling through an airport fence and six lanes of Route 46 traffic before crashing into a clothing warehouse. Twenty people were injured, including two whose car was clipped by the 20-ton jet. View a photo gallery of the Feb. 2 crash.

A month later, a jet skidded off the adjacent runway after pilots overshot their approach. That plane stopped short of Route 46. There were no injuries.

"I think all of us who live and work around Teterboro are reaching the breaking point," Rep. Steve Rothman, D-Fair Lawn, said in a statement. "It's been less than four months since the last injury-producing plane crash. Eventually, there is going to be a horrific disaster: It's simply a matter of probability."

"This airport does not belong here," said Bogota Mayor Steve Lonegan. "I don't know when people are going to wake up."

State Sen. Paul Sarlo, D-Wood Ridge, said he has scheduled a hearing before the Legislative Oversight Committee to discuss the airport and how the Port Authority has responded to this year's accidents. "We need to make sure we're doing everything possible to make this a safer airport," Sarlo said. "On the other side, you need to reduce the capacity."

Last year, Teterboro saw more than 200,000 takeoffs and landings, far too many for such a congested area, airport critics say.

Port Authority officials reiterated Tuesday that they are doing all they can to ensure that the airport is a safe neighbor. Last month, the agency said it will install barriers at the end of two runways to slow or stop out-of-control planes. And Redneck Avenue, a busy road just yards from where the plane crashed Tuesday, will be relocated about 1,000 feet from the runway.

But when it comes to controlling the number of flights in and out of Teterboro, Port Authority officials said their hands are tied.

They have successfully kept jets over 100,000 pounds off the airport's runways and enacted noise restrictions that bar the loudest jets. But agency officials said the FAA could yank funding if the authority is found to be unfairly prohibiting flights.

Some incidents involving air traffic in and around Teterboro Airport:

Dec. 1, 2004: A Gulfstream Aerospace G-IV on landing at Teterboro runs off the runway and into a stand of trees. None of the nine occupants is injured. In a preliminary report, the National Transportation Safety Board says the crew reported that the plane experienced mechanical problems that prevented it from decelerating normally.

Dec. 16, 2003: A Canadair CL-600, the same model involved in Wednesday's crash, ends up in the mud at the end of a Teterboro runway after the pilot aborts the takeoff. There are no injuries in the incident, which the National Transportation Safety Board attributes to pilot error.

March 8, 2002: A small plane crashes and explodes in flames shortly after takeoff from Teterboro Airport, killing its pilot and just missing a stream of vehicles on Route 46.

Dec. 9, 1999: A twin-engine Beech Baron crashes in the yard of a Hasbrouck Heights house and bursts into flames, killing four occupants of the plane. The plane had been scheduled to land at Teterboro.

Jan. 11, 1999: The pilot of a Cessna 310R is killed when his plane crashes in a Kearny freight yard. The crash occurs shortly after takeoff from Teterboro.

March 29, 1993: A private twin-engine plane crashes in an industrial area of Elmwood Park 2 minutes after takeoff from Teterboro Airport, killing all six passengers on board.

May 24, 1988: A twin-engine Learjet slams into a West Paterson hillside, killing all four people aboard. The crash occurs roughly 2 minutes after the plane left Teterboro Airport for a "ferry flight" to Morristown, after the pilot attempted a roll maneuver.

Nov. 10, 1985: A small plane and a corporate jet collide over Fairview, killing six people, including one on the ground. Thirty-five people are left homeless after the jet destroys a row of multifamily homes in Cliffside Park. The collision rains wreckage over an eight-block area.

Jan. 19, 1980: A single-engine plane crashes in Bogota, killing the pilot and passenger.

Other crashes in the region:

Aug. 7, 2004: Two small planes collide over Kinnelon and both pilots are killed when the planes crash to the ground. No one else is aboard either aircraft and there are no injuries on the ground.

Nov. 15, 2002: The pilots of two single-engine planes are killed after a midair collision at Essex County Airport in Fairfield.

Aug. 15, 1993: Two Cessnas collide in midair over Lincoln Park Airport. One of the two pilots dies in the crash; the other walks away with minor injuries. A wing that broke off in the collision hits a car, injuring the occupants.

Nov. 3, 1991: A single-engine plane, traveling from Providence, R.I., goes down in a thicket of trees while trying to land at Essex County Airport in Fairfield, injuring six people.

July 6, 1988: A twin-engine Learjet crashes on approach to Morristown Municipal Airport, killing a co-pilot and injuring the pilot.

May 22, 1986: A single-engine plane crashes into Bearfort Mountain in Wawayanda State Park in West Milford, killing all three people aboard.

Information compiled from the National Transportation Safety Board and archives of The Record.

Today's headlines are mostly of noise battles, near misses and worse, but Teterboro's history is a rich collage of aviation and social milestones. The oldest operating airport in the New York and New Jersey region, it is one of the birthplaces of airmail. Its hangars have served top entertainers and past presidents, and it is now home to a museum. It even has inspired its own song.

WHAT IT IS TODAY:

Located 12 miles from Manhattan, the airport rests on 827 acres in the boroughs of Teterboro, Moonachie and Hasbrouck Heights. Owned and operated by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, Teterboro has two intersecting airstrips, one running northeast-southwest for 6,015 feet, and the other running north-south for 7,000 feet. Scheduled carrier companies and planes weighing more than 100,000 pounds are banned from using the airport. It has 19 hangars and two large office buildings, including one that houses the local office of the federal Department of Homeland Security. Five aviation companies offering everything from fuel to food to chartering services operate on-site.

Whom it serves: A travel hub for corporate charter jets and smaller general-aviation planes, the airport had 202,720 arrivals and departures in 2004. It also is a major cargo hub used by many small-package delivery services and by couriers for the country's network of Federal Reserve banks and its local clearinghouses in Rutherford and Lodi. In addition, Teterboro is the primary receiving point for hearts and other human organs needed for transplant operations in the region. The Port Authority credits the airport with creating 5,000 jobs, 1,200 of them on-site.

IN THE PAST:

The property that became the airport was acquired by Walter C. Teter in 1917, when the surrounding lands were occupied by swamps and a golf course. A year later, the Wittemann Aircraft and New York Air Terminal Corp. used the property to convert former World War I fighter planes into a fleet of airmail carriers. The first recorded flight took off in 1919.

In 1921, the Wittemann company made history by designing a plane that carried 825 pounds of mail from Teterboro to San Francisco, the longest distance then covered by a mail plane, according to Pat Reilly, director of the New Jersey Aviation Hall of Fame Museum. That same year the company built for the military what was then the largest plane in the world, the Barling Bomber, which had three wings and six engines, Reilly said.

In the 1920s and 1930s, Teterboro was home to many innovations in aircraft technology, with hangars operated by Wright Aeronautical Co. and by Anthony Fokker, the famous Dutch aircraft designer. Fokker invented the first engine cooled by air instead of water, which enabled the first flight across the North Pole. Teterboro became a stop-off place for many of the big names in aviation, including Charles Lindbergh, who had his Spirit of St Louis serviced there, and Amelia Earhart, who made her historic trans-Atlantic flight in 1932 in a plane designed at Teterboro, Reilly said.

Also in the 1920s and 1930s, Gates Flying Circus used the airport as its summer home, holding weekly shows for Bergen County residents with stunts that featured acrobats walking on wings or clinging to a plane by their teeth, Reilly said.

During World War II, the airport was closed down by the military so that fighter planes could be stored there in case of an attack on the New York region.

It was reopened in 1946 by Fred Wehran, who paved its runways and quickly transformed it into one of the busiest privately owned airports in the country, Reilly said.

In 1949, Wehran sold the airport to the Port Authority, which in 1970 leased it to Pan Am World Airways, and then to its successor organization, Johnson Controls, for 30 years. In 2000, the PA assumed full responsibility for the airport.

In 1954, CBS radio and television personality Arthur Godfrey put Teterboro Airport on the map after recording a song called "Teterboro Tower." The inspiration for the song was an incident in which he was accused of "buzzing" the airport tower after being denied permission to take off from his favorite runway. The song became a nationwide hit.

Former presidents Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton have used Teterboro after leaving office. Johnny Carson famously took flying lessons there. Frank Sinatra, Bill Cosby, Harrison Ford and John Travolta are among the celebrities who have frequently flown out of Teterboro.

In 1972, an aviation museum that later became chartered as the state's official aviation hall of fame opened at Teterboro.

In the 1990s, state and federal authorities began to encourage corporate jet owners to move their operations to Teterboro to reduce delays at Newark. The change intensified complaints by residents of neighboring towns over aircraft noise and safety. Airport opponents won victories in 2001 and 2003, stopping Boeing 737 jets from being able to use the airport and thwarting a charter company that was said to be planning scheduled service from the airport.        from this link