(CNN) — After his plane ripped into pieces as it crashed Sunday night in a Utah neighborhood, the pilot was found burned and banged up but coherent, according to a witness.
The Cessna 210 single-engine plane went down shortly before 6 p.m. in a residential area of Roy, Utah, according to Ogden police dispatcher Brittany Dean.
The plane had been cleared for landing at nearby Ogden Airport when it crashed, said Mike Fergus of the Federal Aviation Administration.
Gary Cox was in the neighborhood, attending a family birthday party, when the power went out right after the plane went down. He told CNN affiliate KSL that he and a few other people found a man, later identified as the pilot, lying on the ground.
“He was confused, hurt and in a lot of pain,” Cox said. “But he was able to answer questions and get where he needed to be.”
The plane’s engine sat in the front yard of a house, Cox said, with other parts strewn throughout the neighborhood.
Roy fire Chief John Ritchie told KSL that the pilot was talking when he was transported to a local hospital, where he was in critical condition Sunday night.
Two occupied homes — one with three people inside, the other with two — caught fire after the crash, Ritchie said. But no one inside was hurt and, within about an hour, firefighters were able to put out the fires.
The crash knocked out power for 1,700 homes, starting at 5:58 p.m., said Margaret Oler of Rocky Mountain Power. By 7:10 p.m., power had been restored to all but 875 customers. A nearby elementary school was opened as a temporary shelter for those without heat and lights, Ritchie said.
Visibility was minimal at the time of the crash, as the National Weather Service had issued a dense fog advisory for the area. That warning remains in effect until 9 a.m. Monday.
Roy is about 6 miles southwest of Ogden, with the affected neighborhood near Ogden-Hinckley Airport – CNN
