Kiara Rubio(LAS VEGAS) — Residents of a neighborhood in Las Vegas got an unwelcome surprise Thursday in the form of an airplane door falling out of the sky and hitting an apartment building and car.
The incident took place near Nellis Air Force Base, which is just northeast of Las Vegas. It is unclear what type of plane the debris fell off, but it did not appear to come from a civilian aircraft.
“We are looking into a report that a door or a panel fell off an aircraft near Nellis AFB,” the Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement.
A photo taken by a resident in the area of the apartment building showed the door lying on a sidewalk.
The Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department was investigating the accident, but said it appeared as though no one was injured.
“When it hit it was loud,” eyewitness Anthony Pitts told Las Vegas ABC affiliate KTNV-TV. “The first thing I did was run in the house. I’m not going to lie, I was scared. I thought it was a shooting, that’s how loud it was.”
The FAA had an inspector at the site on Thursday.
The door fell from the sky right next to two elementary schools, and only a few blocks from the military base.
“One of my kids could have been walking out here and that thing would have hit him, it’s not going to be a concussion,” Pitts said. “They would be dead.”
The Nellis Air Force Base contains the Air Force Warfare Center, and the 99th Air Base Wing, 57th Wing and a handful of other units. It is also the home of the the USAF Thunderbirds demonstration team.
Copyright © 2019, ABC Radio. All rights reserved.