Tragedy on the 79th Floor 

Today in History, July 28: 1945 – A US Army Air Corps B-25 “Mitchell” bomber, lost in the fog over Manhattan, crashes into the Empire State Building. The same type aircraft had been utilized in the Doolittle Raid over Tokyo in 1942. The airplane had missed the Chrysler Building, but in diverting from impact with that skyscraper, turned into the Empire State Building, then the tallest building in the country. The aircraft’s high octane fuel severely damaged the structure, several of her parts landed on or in nearby buildings, and one of her engines caused an elevator to fall. the safety features in the elevator stopped it’s free-fall, and the woman occupying it was saved just before the engine landed upon it. All three crew members and 11 workers in the building were killed.