DALLAS (AP) – Two historic military aircraft collided and crashed Saturday during an air show in Dallas, exploding in a ball of flames and sending black smoke billowing into the sky.  It was not clear how many people were on board.
Emergency crews rushed to the crash site at Dallas Executive Airport, about 10 miles (16 kilometers) from downtown.  News footage from the scene showed crumpled wreckage of the planes in a grassy area within the airport perimeter.  Dallas Fire-Rescue told The Dallas Morning News that no injuries were reported among people on the ground.
Anthony Montoya saw the two planes collide.
“I just stood there.  I was in complete shock and disbelief,” said Montoya, 27, who attended the air show with a friend.  “Everyone around had gasped.  Everyone burst into tears.  Everyone was shocked.”
Officials did not say how many people were on the planes, but Hank Coates, president of the company that organized the air show, said one of the planes, a B-17 Flying Fortress bomber, typically has a crew of four to five.  .  The other, a P-63 Kingcobra fighter, has a single pilot.
There were no paying customers on board, said Coates of the Commemorative Air Force, which also owns the planes.  Their aircraft are flown by highly trained volunteers, often retired pilots, he said.
Investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board will arrive at the crash site in Dallas on Sunday.
Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson said the NTSB had control of the crash scene, with local police and fire departments providing support.
“The videos are heartbreaking,” Johnson tweeted.
The planes collided and crashed around 1:20 p.m., the Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement.  The collision occurred during the Commemorative Air Force Wings Over Dallas show.
Victoria Yeager, the widow of famed Air Force pilot Chuck Yeager and a pilot herself, was also at the show.  He didn’t see the crash, but he did see the burning wreckage.
“It was pulverized,” said Yeager, 64, who lives in Fort Worth.
“We were hoping they had all gotten out, but we knew they hadn’t,” he said of the occupants.
A cornerstone of US air power during World War II, the B-17 is a massive four-engine bomber used in daylight raids against Germany.  The Kingcobra, an American fighter plane, was used primarily by Soviet forces during the war.  Most B-17s were scrapped at the end of World War II, and only a few remain today, largely on display in museums and air shows, according to Boeing.
Multiple videos posted on social media showed the fighter jet flying into the bomber, causing it to quickly fall to the ground and spark a large ball of fire and smoke.
“It was really horrible to see,” said Aubrey Anne Young, 37, of Leander.  Texas, which saw the crash.  Her children were inside the shed with their father when it happened.  “I’m still trying to make sense of it.”
A woman next to Young can be heard crying and screaming hysterically in a video Young posted to her Facebook page.
Airshow safety – particularly with older military aircraft – has been a concern for years.  In 2011, 11 people were killed in Reno, Nevada, when a P-51 Mustang crashed into spectators.  In 2019, a bomber crashed in Hartford, Connecticut, killing seven people.  The NTSB said at the time that it had investigated 21 accidents since 1982 involving World War II-era bombers, resulting in 23 deaths.
Wings Over Dallas bills itself as “America’s Premier World War II Airshow,” according to a website promoting the event.  The show was scheduled for Nov. 11-13, Veterans Day weekend, and visitors were to see more than 40 World War II-era aircraft.  Saturday afternoon’s flight schedule included a “bomber parade” and “fighter escort” featuring B-17s and P-63s.
Videos of past Wings Over Dallas events depict vintage warplanes flying low, sometimes in close formation, on simulated bombing or strafing flights.  The videos also show the planes performing aerobatics.
The FAA has also launched an investigation, officials said.
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Bleed reported from Little Rock, Arkansas.  Bobby Caina Calvan in New York, Ken Miller in Oklahoma City and Dave Kolpack in Fargo, ND contributed to this report.