you can see here the crowd starting to rush over there. >> i was on switer, one of the topics on twitter now. twitterer, zigfather, relatively new, he is seeing it himself. he is talking about the rescue helicopters there. he said emergency vehicles on site. sound like that is what he is seeing himself. fred, we have gotten an ireport from the area. david thompson. we are sending out the word now. if you are among the people who is seeing it and can safely send us an ireport, ireport.com. easy to upload your photos, videos, stories. tell us what you are seeing. we give you a call. make sure you have seen is as well. fred, we are monitoring, twitter, facebook. telling everyone if you have seen this. aware, impacting you, my pages, facebook and

twitter,/joshlevscnn. >> to recap. happening right now. for the second time this year. we have an air emergency in new york's hudson river. rescue efforts are under way right now after a reported collision of a helicopter and a small plane. and it happened just after noon today. six people reportedly on board the chopper which belongs to a local sightseeing company, called liberty tours. according to the u.s. coast guard only one person has been recovered so far. here's what other eyewitnesses are telling us. >> i did not see the collision. i looked up into the sky. and i saw a plume of smoke. i saw a helicopter twirling through the air. and the rotors were removed. there were pieces and shards of the helicopter flying around. the actual body of the helicopter turned and made a nose-dive straight down while there were still parts of the rotor floating above it. >> we were walking. we heard the loud bang and saw the plane and helicopter go into

the water. >> then what? >> well, i mean we saw the plane, lost its wing and whirly birding its way down. brown smoke coming out of the back of it. it crashed into the water. a few second later the helicopter with debris flying off of it also hit as well. and it was just a matter of minutes before we saw a number of different boats rushing to the scene. we saw a little debris falling in hoboken, right up the street in front of us. >> all right. that was the account of many eyewitnesses who saw this happening right there at the hudson river. midair collision, a helicopter, tourist helicopter, which it is believed at least six people may have been on board. and a small aircraft that we also understand took off from the teeterboro airport, reliever airport in new jersey. a lot of small aircraft fly in and out of that airport. susan candiotti live from lower manhattan. you described earlier, susan, just the location of this point,

the focal point for the search-and-rescue mission not far from liberty island, statue of libber team. it also means it attracted a huge crowd. what are you seeing? >> fredericka, i have a poor connection with you. let me try to pick it up best i can. we are standing alongside the hudson river, lower manhattan, and hoboken new jersey other side. at our site is statue of liberty lower manhattan. the scene, helicopters flying overhead. i counted at least five or six boats, the fire department of new york, the u.s. coast guard has one near or on the scene here. new york city police department also assisting in this operation. and they are circling the area of this midair collision. where a small plane according to authorities appears to have taken off from teeterboro airport, small private airport in new jersey.

and struck a helicopter in midair before both crashed into the hudson river. we are hearing reports of at least one person who has been rescued, possibly more. at this time, we have heard from eyewitnesses who talk about seeing debris fall from the plane and the blades of the helicopters as both fell into the water shortly after this collision took place at about noontime today. in the meantime, we are however now seeing other traffic going up and down the hudson river including some barges that are being towed and small boats as well. there are a few of those however. mainly commercial traffic at this time. so the rescue operation or recovery operation is of course well under way here. authorities try to figure out of course how this happened. all we had heard is that after the small plane took off from

teeterboro airport before noontime, that the control tower lost radar contact and radar contact with it. of course we are in touch with the faa, and the national transportation safety board to try to figure out exactly what happen. the helicopter as you had heard is a touring helicopter. those are frequent leap uly used manhattan to tour the island and various sites. with at least six people on board according to the new york city police department. fredericka? >> susan, thank you so much from lower manhattan. we did have some images, via broadband, upper left hand part of the screen there. that is midtown -- on the west side highway. actually the heliport where the liberty tour helicopters take off and land. so you are seeing right there, there are some helicopters there. and you see the police presence. and there have been a lot of

people who are passer-by whose now know the helicopter involved in midair collision with the small aircraft originates from there. dan berman from ntsb, national traffic safety board, an investigator he is with us right now as well. so, mr. berman, we are hearing eyewitnesses say everything from the helicopter and the plane traveling southbound, somehow, a wing was sheered and then the two aircraft intertwined and then corkscrewed right into the hudson river. is this about what you have learned in the early stages of your investigation? >> hello? >> dan berman, are you with me? >> i'm sorry, this is dan berman, go ahead. >> ben berman. we are hearing how the two aircraft were both traveling southbound, then somehow, a wing was sheered off the small aircraft, they became intertwined and then simply descended into the hudson river. is that about what you are learning?

>> well from what the eyewitnesses are reporting it sound look with the aircraft corkscrewing down it does suggest possibility the wing was sheered off the aircraft, one wing. of course with the helicopter going straight down that would suggest possibly the rotor, main rotor made contact with the wing of the aircraft. and a rotor failure. the ntsb is going to investigate. they will eventually find the significant parts of this aircraft and be able to track down the pattern of failure and will use radar tracks to see how the aircraft also managed to come together as well. but right now that is what it looks like. >> of course, first priority is trying to get to any potential survivors. is the ntsb, in any way, involved in that. do you donate resources in that effort as well? >> the ntsb will take over after the search rescue recovery operation is complete. so right now the top priority is to rescue anybody who has survived the accident. and may be injured or may be ready to be rescued. after that, they will be,

continue to search for any victims of the crash. and the ntsb will move to look for wreckage and piece it together. >> what is your understanding where the search-and-rescue stand right now. the u.s. coast guard is confirming one person has been rescued do you know anything about the condiagnostion of tha person? haw haw i don >> i don't. if reports are correct there is not anything on the surface that will be less of a likelihood as time goes on. >> we heard from an eyewitness earlier, that nothing was buoyant. how deep is the hudson river at this point? >> i don't know. plenty of depth to be well below the surface at this point. >> ben berman, ntsb, appreciate that. the bulk of their investigation beginning as he said after the search-and-rescue mission because that indeed is top priority. u.s. ghost card saying one person has been pulled from the

water we don't know the condition of that person and they continue to search for others. we know at least six people have been on board that helicopter that collided with the small aircraft which we now understand may have originated from a small company in philadelphia. jacqui jeras, our meteorologist, keeping a close eye on the weather conditions there. you look at pictures. looks like a beautiful day. a lot of folks were out walking. we heard that from the eyewitnesses and a beautiful day to be flying. how about the wind conditions? >> wind were fine. overall relatively calm. anywhere between 3 and 6 miles per hour. variable too. they were coming from the east or coming from the south. when you are talking about wind that light it is very insignificant. i also checked the upper level winds. and they weren't all that strong either. this is a satellite loop of the area, just kind of showing you there were patchy cloud. cloud at different levels in the atmosphere. but overall sky conditions were just fine. at this point we have no reason to believe that weather would be a concern.

just kind of wanted to give you a little tour. show you the area a little better if you are not familiar with hoboken, new york, manhattan island. zoom in for you a little bit. you can see upstate new york, long island area. and going to take a little minute. there it goes. zooming into the area there. here you can see the river. there is the river. there is hoboken. this is manhattan island. this is the spot we are talking to. going to zoom in a little bit. there you can see all the piers on both sides. i understand that emergency personnel is on both sides of the river as they continue their effort at this time. water temperatures for your information, about 75, 76 degrees. so that is plenty warm and there is a brisk current also that moves through the river. so just to kind of give you a better perspective where we are talking about and what kind of weather conditions have been going on. >> offers a lot of clarity. what we are talking about. you mention the piers jutting out on the side, manhattan pier

40, apparently is the pier closest to the crash scene that is now being investigated. as well. >> okay. >> you are able to zoom in. >> we'll try to find that for you. not exactly which one is pier 40. >> not that far from the whole midtown heliport location where the chopper took off. we are talking general vicinity the aircraft are fairly used to given the small aircraft took off from teeterboro, we understand, the helicopter taking off there on the west side as well. >> jacqui jeras we'll check back with you. thank you for the map. that helps us get great perspective. we have been hearing from eyewitnesses all in different forms, whether it be in hotels nearby, or those who were also walking. people are sending their ireports and they're also twittering information. josh levs will be joining us to share on that front. and mayor michael bloomberg of new york, also to hold a press conference momentarily. we'll take you there live when it happens.

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welcome back to our live coverage now. search-and-rescue mission under way in the hudson river. a midair collision taking place between a tourist helicopter and small plane. we understand that the two aircraft were both flying southbound according to eyewitness accounts. and somehow collided into one another. sheered the wing of the aircr t aircraft. we talked to the ntsb, an goitor who said likely the way the helicopter just simply fell into

the water, a rotor then fell off. and we understand that six people may have been on board the tourist helicopter. it belongs to liberty tours which takes off out of midtown manhattan, often uses this route very familiar to it. we also understand the small aircraft may have taken off from teeterboro -- new jersey's airport, feeder airport in the area. we have been hearing from eyewitnesses. you can see a beautiful day there in manhattan. david thompson is an eyewitness. he is with us right now. and you also snapped off a photograph of the scene. what did you experience? what did you hear and see? >> yes, ma'am. well i was on a boat tour in the hudson. and was talking with my aunt. turned around after i heard a pop. and saw the blade fly off from the helicopter and both of the two air crafts mangled in amongst each other and then just descending down into the river. so it was very intense.

>> you were on a tour boat in the area, immediately, did it reroute itself? what happened in those moments? >> we actually were on a tour and we joined the search-and-rescue time. the photo that i sent in on ireports was of the nypd rescue helicopter that came out about ten minutes later. we joined about ten other boats and circled the area in the hudson. >> what did you see in that time? >> there was plenty of debris. just little -- looked like different parts from both of the aircra aircraft. just floating there right outside of our boat. we didn't see any people. i think there was a diver that went in as well. that was what was reported. we were actually taken back into the boat. we weren't allowed on the deck. >> when your boat then joined ten other boats. at the time you hearing the pop

of sound and taking the picture as we see in the upper left hand corner of the nypd helicopter. what's the proximity. how far distance were you from the actual crash site? >> we were only about 200 yards from the actual crash site. so when i turned around and looked up in the sky, both of the aircraft were 200 yards and they were about 75 feet to 100 feet in the air. it was pretty close by. >> sorry, go ahead. >> we were able to get to the site within a minute, once we started sailing again. >> you were able to see pretty clearly the debris on the water's surface. small pieces of debris. nothing that seemed to you to represent a tail or a fuselage or anything significant of either one of the aircraft? >> no. uh-uh. all of the major elements were completely submerged from what i could see from my vantage point. just different like propellers and, just looked like, the end

of a car crash. kind of like different pieces, just, just floating there on the top of the water. >> are you from the area? or were you visiting? >> no, i was visiting. yeah, my birthday today from boon, north carolina. i was just in the area with family reunion. yes, ma'am. >> all right, david thompson. thank you so much for your account of what took place. thank you for sharing that photograph of what you saw. the emergency response kicking into high gear. within minutes say so many eye it happened so quickly that midair collision. so quickly so many different agencies were there. new york coast guard, fire department, new york police department, ntsb, heard from an investigator also on the scene right now as well. all trying to find more survivors. the top priority. although the u.s. coast guard says one person has been rescued. we don't know the condition of the person. still an intense search under way to try to find any other

persons before they are able to get to the bottom of what happened. josh levs joining us right now as well. josh, you have been hearing from people in different forms and fashion and doing a lot of digging to try to help us understand what exactly has taken place here. >> absolutely. fred, hearing from people every which way there is. let me show you something that is interesting. a website called mashable, follows youtube, facebook, twitter. what they have up right now. talking about this case. pointing out there are some people. one guy sent out a picture via twitter, claiming the tire fell in front of his car, believes it was connected into one of the planes. >> where was that person located? >> he was in the hoboken area. geographically it would make sense. but you know a lot of questions. this is what happens on twitter. check this out. see this list here, top topics on twitter. see right now. hudson river one of the top ones. helicopter. so there are a lot of people weighing in. look for key words. what you see is a lot of people exchanging information, sending

links. we have spoken to these people ourselves, a series of ireports. people who are at the scene. we called them. talked to them. we know what they are seeing. you talked to one of them. what we are seeing from jim davidson. a series of photos. i will show you a few here. that show what is going on on the scene right now with the authorities gathering together. get this to work. authorities gathering and looking out there. he says crowds have been gathering there. he also says he was able to hear what he knows what was the crash. he was close enough to it at the time. i am thinking we can take some of these fullen the control room. some of the photos he sent in. we encourage everyone to send what you have got, ireport, facebook or twitter. send us the photos, videos stories, let us know. this is a guy you were talking to. see more of your pictures as well. >> david thompson. >> yeah, showing you this. minutes ago. then you talked with him on the phone. there are a lot of people in the

area. snapping photos. able to give us a description. let us know. keep it coming here. we have twitter and facebook pages. josh levscnn. want to talk to you. what you are seeing and confirm it. fred, i will stand here. keep making lots of phone calls. >> josh, important really, a good bulk of our information is coming from eyewitnesses. this happened just after the noon eastern hour. fairly high traffic. people out enjoying their saturday. they're walking by. or as we heard from david thompson actually on a tour boat there in the hudson. he was with family celebrating his birthday. then he heard the loud pop. then saw, as he described the blade actually come off the chopper there. again we understand this midair collision taking place between a tourist helicopter, maybe six people on board, usually takes off. and land out of the midtown manhattan area. then we understand a small aircraft which may have taken off from the teeterboro, new jersey airport, feeder airport there in the triborough --

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welcome back. i am fredricka whitfield in atlanta. looking at live pictures on the right-hand side of your screen. the location where new york mayor michael bloomberg will take to the podium to talk about the midair collision taking place just off lower manhattan there in the hudson river. a collision between a tourist helicopter where at least six people may have been on board. it is tied to the liberty tours service which operate out of midtown, manhattan, and a collision with a small aircraft believed to have taken off from the teeterboro, new jersey feeder airport. small airport that is usually used by commercial, small private aircraft and we understand that that plane just might have originated from a company out of philadelphia. meantime, the two collided. eyewitnesses saw it on a beautiful day just after noontime. now the faa according to the associated press is reporting there were three people on board the airplane that collided with that tourist helicopter. the u.s. coast guard is reporting that one person was rescued. we don't know the condiagnosis

of that person, however. but an intense search-and-rescue mission is under way to locate any one else who may have been involved in this collision. as we await, mayor bloomberg to take the podium there and update us as best we can. we will talk to eyewitnesses who saw a lot of what has transpired there over the last couple hours. arnold stevens was at the w hotel which is very close to where this collision took place. he happened to be on his balcony, enjoying the view there, he is back with us to give us an idea of what happened when you heard what you described earlier as a loud crashing sound. and these two colliding. >> yeah, that's right. i heard a loud crash. i heard people who were -- you know, jogging and bicycling along the river scream. i turned and i saw both the plane corkscrew very quickly, descending into the river.

maybe 100 yards away. the helicopter dropped right into the water. it happened all very, very quickly. it was very surreal. you didn't know at the instant whether it was some sort of put-on or whether it was, you know a true accident, it became apparent very, very quickly it was something tragic. on the scene, all surrounding boats. presuming private and commercial to the area. very, very quickly. probably within six or seven minutes, i would say the accident happened around noon. maybe a couple minutes after noon. so minutes later there were professional nypd or coast guard boats on the scene. >> lots of agencies involved. the u.s. coast guard, new york police department as you mentioned. new york fire department as well as the faa, now investigating as well as ntsb. we spoke with an investigator,

arnold, with the ntsb earlier. i described for him exactly what you described to us about one of the wings being sheered off and that helicopter simply dropping like a rock. he said based on that description it sound as though the rotor of the helicopter came off. that explains why it dropped down so quickly. and other eyewitness accounts were that these two aircraft were actually both traveling southbound. and that perhaps somehow visibility problem occurs, maybe with one of the aircraft when they could be flying so close to one another. simply not be able to see each other. were you able to notice whether it appeared they were flying in the same direction? >> i wasn't able to see whether they were flying in the same direction. but, it is almost crystal clear day here. i have a hard time believing two planes, two helicopters or plane and helicopter couldn't see each other flying. it's really a rather gorgeous day here on the river. >> the top priority is the

search-and-rescue mission. ntsb says it is going to look into what exactly happened after the search and res skew has been completed. we understand now, according to the faa to reiterate if you are just joining us, three people may have been on the fixed wing aircraft which we are hearing described as a piper pa 32. it may have originated from a company out of philadelphia. but it is understood that a plane, meeting the same kind of description did take off from teeterboro, new jersey airport and simply lost contact with control tower there. and this small, helicopter which six people may have been on board actually origionates from a midtown manhattan company called liberty tours. on this day, arnold, beautiful day as you described it, did it appear there was a lot of aircraft activity taking place right there outside of the hudson? did you happen to notice that before the collision were to take place? >> certainly. there seemed to be a normal amount of aircraft.

typically you can always look up around here and see the occasion helicopter and of course we're near two, three, major airports. so there is always a good amount of air traffic. but certainly didn't seem to be anything out of the ordinary. seemed to really be just a perfect ordinary sunny, beautiful day. >> one person was rescued according to the u.s. coast guard. from your purview were you able to see anything that resembled a rescue mission or anything like that? >> yes. i did. about six or seven minutes after the collision i saw a helicopter come in rapidly, descend probably, guessing 30 feet above the water. two people in what appeared to be scuba gear descended from the helicopter into the water. i was unable to see any sort of rescue or any, any, anyone being rescued put back into the --

into the helicopter. but i definitely did see two scuba-gear people jump into the water. >> we do understand new york police department has provided the divers involved in this search-and-rescue mission. and right now, the upper left hand corner of your screen you are seeing the midtown heliport where liberty tours operates. you are seeing kind of grainy video here. but this is the location where the helicopters with the liberty tours, very popular tourist sight seeing business, operate out of. and we are also waiting, any minute now, mayor michael bloomberg to take to the microphones there. not necessarily that location. there in lower manhattan to address this midair collision that has taken place. arnold stevens, thank you so much for being with us. and recounting all that you have seen thus far. we'll be right back with much more.

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hello, i'm fredricka whitfield in atlanta. in the new york/new jersey area. a sizable investigation under way. a search-and-rescue mission is

under way to look for any survivors of a midair collision between a tourist helicopter and a small aircraft. cnn is confirming that on board the small aircraft three people on their way to ocean city, new jersey. we also have received confirmation from the liberty tours group that it was their helicopter involved in this midair collision. at least six people may have been on board that aircraft. now we also understand from the u.s. coast guard that one person has been rescued it is unclear the condiagnosis of that person. the search-and-rescue still under way to find any other survivors in this collision taking place just after noontime today. so many eyewitness accounts have been flooding in to us here at cnn. sharing their views of what they heard, saw and how the search is under way. mayor michael bloomberg of new york will be holding a press conference momentarily. when that happens we will be able to bring that to you live. earlier we spoke with a retired commercial pilot, john wily. this was his account of all that

has taken place thus far. any day that ends in why is going to be a busy day in the corridor. you have a lot of traffic going into the reliever airports. newark, teeterboro used by aviation and business jets. numerous other small airports. this corridor going up the east river at one time there was a proposal to close the corridor. there have been acts to lower the envelope so that previously i think airplanes were allowed to fly as high as 3,000 feet up and down the corridor. very obviously a picturesque area you can see a lot of the new york area in. but the problem that you have got is that almost in any vehicle that you are in, ear plane or helicopter, you are going to have certain blind spots. and from the information that i received in just a little bit of time i have done the research on this it appears that both vehicles were moving in the same

direction. so a possible overtake could have created a blind spot for one of the vehicles. not to see the other. >> yeah, one eyewitness says they were both flying southbound. >> well. anything that is under your nose of the aircraft is going to be invisible to you. you are not going to be doing that much maneuvering left and right or banking. because you have a relatively narrow corridor that you have to stay within. people are going to be looking at the skyline of new york. a beautiful day from what i have seen of it. two airplanes in proximity which doesn't work. >> we hear from our meteorologist, jacqui jeras, it is a clear day. weather not likely a factor here. of course when jackie is available we will be able to get perhaps the wind speed or weather, some times wind may be a factor in, investigations of aviation accidents. such as this. we are learning a little bit

more about the aircraft. john, real quickly. piper pa-32. what can you tell me about that. >> look in my dossier and figure out what a 32 is. i imagine a small single engine. my aviation buddies will hammer me if i get it wrong. i will just defer. a great day no doubt if they came out of teeterboro they're going to be up having a great day looking out, the fortunate thing, if there is a fortunate thing about this, is that we do have one survivor who is going to be better than any cockpit voice recorder. >> pretty extraordinary. john, looking at an image now of a piper pa 32. i'm pretty much a novice on aircraft. not really sure what it would mean this type of aircraft besides the fact that it is a very small one. your estimation on how many people might be aboard a pa 32? >> again. hang on for just a second. >> should give you time. i will give you time to look that up, john. >> pa 32.

looking at it now. possibly four people on board. you have extra windows back there. maybe as many as six. >> all right that was retired commercial pilot john wily. we since learned now, and have gotten confirmation, on board that aircraft that is very similar to the one that you saw, piper pa 32. three people were on board. they were on their way to ocean city, new jersey. that plane had just taken off shortly before impacting with that helicopter. that had taken off from the teeterboro airport. all right. former d.c. police detective and cnn security analyst mike brooks is joining us on the phone right now. lots of agencies involved in this investigation right now, mike. everyone from newark police department, fire, as well as ntsb, faa, u.s. coast guard. give me an idea how all the agencies will cooperate in an investigation of this size? >> the initial response, new

york city has a very, very robust plan for water rescue and water response plan. we saw this going into effect during the u.s.airways crash. we have heard from some of the ireporters, new york city aviation unit dropping a diving into the water. they have a plan where they pick up an officer from the emergency services unit also a diver. they are usually some of the first on the scene. right now, after talking to my fire department and law enforcement, nypd sources they're telling me right now that the fire department has five marine units on the scene. the police department has numerous boats from their harbor unit. all the divers who are in the water right now are nypd divers from, from the emergency services unit. what they're doing right now, fred, all the agencies, nypd, coast guard are conducting a grid search of the area. what they will to is put together a plan at command center. they will go back and forth using a grid. also, one of the things you have

to take into consideration are the tides and also the speed of the river. some of that, some of the debris could be washed downshore as we saw during the u.s.airways flight, recovery. all these things taken into consideration. and then on the other side there is an investigation going on with the nypd and new jersey units and new jersey authorities as well as the ntsb on exactly what happened. they're going to go back and take a look at the radar tapes. most likely out of teeterboro and also la guardia to see what was the exact flight of this general aviation plane that took off from teeterboro airport. and also, what was the exact flight of this helicopter. most aviation -- aviation agencies whether it be small planes, the piper or the helicopter, that are below 1,500 feet they're usually on visual flight plans if you will. and we heard our commercial pilot, john wily, talking about possibly one aircraft overtake

the other and a possible blind spot. all things they will talk to witnesses what they saw and what they heard. a lot of it, fred is going to come done to the radar tapes and the one survivor we are hearing from either the helicopter or the aircraft. because the helicopter and the general aviation piper do not have any cockpit voice recorders or any of the black boxes like commercial aviation does. so we're not going to know a whole lot except for the witnesses and the people on board. >> wow, fascinating stuff. also fascinating tioo is eyewitnesses say they saw the two aircraft going in the same direction. the whole blind spot issue john wily brought to our attention is fascinating. you have been looking at still images coming in from various reporters, eyewitnesses. you have also seen helicopters in some of the shots. this is not the actual helicopter involved in the collision. these are actually search helicopters that are involved here. so, mike, you have given us an idea of the various resources being used here.

cooperation on the federal level, new york and new jersey areas there. they're all focussing on trying to get to any potential survivors. give me an idea how that is also, also very comply kated. the investigative side of this search. what happened. they can't overlook various factors while they're looking for potential survivors. how do they strike a balance? >> well you have two things going on. you have the search-and-rescue effort. police, fire, ems, new york, new jersey. then you have the investigative side. one of the things that came into play during the investigation of the u.s.airways flight was in fact some of the security cameras along the river there, along the river. guarantee you that detectives from nypd and on the new jersey side, hoboken, jersey city, they're going around to some of the buildings that may have surveillance cameras that show the river and that will help

them piece together a timeline of exactly when and where all of these things happened and that will help them determine where do we start our search. where exactly did the two planes, the helicopter and the plane, go down. you know? did one hit the water maybe north or south or east or west. that will help them determine exactly where they're going to do their grid search. if, in fact, the water flowing southward of the hudson as the river flows exactly where some of the pieces of debris may be. >> fascinating. this is a very busy portion of the hudson. this is very busy thoroughfare. and as the days go on. they're still going to need to be searching for debris, for pieces of the wreckage. do you suspect they will close the thoroughfare quite some time, redirecting. how do they protect this area? >> will they go ahead and put for general aviation they will put restricted airspace on this area to keep any onlookers in

their own, own planes, helicopters. you know some of the tourist helicopters and business helicopters that go up and down the hudson on a regular basis that will all be basically restricted to search-and-rescue and on the other side they will go ahead and the coast guard will probably go ahead and cut off any kind of commerce boats or anything on hudson until they determine what kind of search pattern they're going to do and how long they're going to go ahead and have the search-and-recovery or if this is going to turn into a recovery stage if you will of the operation. but right now. authority are still kconsiderin it a search-and-rescue stage of the crash. >> mike brooks, former d.c. police detective. thank you for joining us. appreciate that. we continue to watch the developments here. the search-and-rescue mission there on the hudson river between lower manhattan and hoboken, new jersey. midair collision between a

tourist helicopter. believed six on board, and a small aircraft which we now have confirmed had three people on board. they had just taken off from teeterboro, new jersey airport on their way to ocean city, new jersey. mayor michael bloomberg of new york will be holding a press conference. when that happens we'll take that live. moisturizing body washes, you might as well be. you see, their moisturizer sits on top of skin, almost as if you're wearing it. only new dove deep moisture has nutriummoisture, a breakthrough formula with natural moisturizers... that can nourish deep down. it's the most effective natural nourishment ever. new dove deep moisture with nutriummoisture. superior natural nourishment for your skin.

after this midair collision taking place over the hudson river. almost three hours ago, more than 2 1/2 hours ago. a tourist helicopter with six people possibly on board colliding with a small aircraft that took off just minutes earlier from the teeterboro airport. confirmation of three people on board. we continue to await newest developments on the search-and-rescue mission taking place there in hudson river. josh levs keeping a close tab on what has been taking place. hearing from a number of eyewitnesses on so many different levels with different accounts of what has happened. >> fred, minutes ago i said i spotted on mashable, a twit-pic part of a tire someone says fell

in front of the car. it is his story. jason miller? jason talk to me about this. i will show everyone this picture. you say this fellen front of your car. where were you, what happened? >> i was driving in new jersey, into hoboken. i turned on to sinatra drive which runs out to the hudson. >> i pulled up a picture. you have the hudson right here. then just to the west of that where the a is, that is sinatra drive. geographically makes sense. you hear something, what happened? >> yeah, i actually saw it on my car. next thing my girlfriend and i saw debris falling out of the sky. and a big splash in the hudson. about, i would say 20 feet in front of me maybe closer, little farther, the tire fell on the roadway in front of our car. >> i can't tell from the picture, just seeing the rubber casing for a tire or actual tire material in there? tire is rubber casing, is it

just the exterior or solid what fell? >> looks like just the exterior. i didn't see the rim or anything inside. >> this fell in front. could have hit your car? >> could have, yeah. must have had some velocity coming from the skies. looking at your twitter page you have since looked, still images and you do believe you saw there were three tires attached to the plane. you have extra reason to believe this was from the crash? >> yeah, that type of aircraft has the same tire. i have reason to believe it is. i saw the wing spiraling down, maybe the wing may have hit something. >> we have been getting ireport photos. jason you have been in the area, what are you seeing? what is it like? what did it sound like when you were there? >> yeah, you know we had jersey city cops, hoboken, fire and rescue, people on the new york side, converging on the site. they have since shut down the main road. i actually ended up leaving.

it was just a lot of people looked very scared. looking at the sky and running. i don't think anybody really knew what happened. there was one cop that was next to me. i think he was probably one of the first to call it in. he didn't really see it either. not too many people saw it. i didn't even see the plane just the wing and tire. >> heard a sound and knew to look in the area. want to emphasize, it is not from the helicopter at all. that's not what we are talking about. talking about the plane. >> appears it would be to the plane, the plane that wrecked. >> want to emphasize that. images you were able to see later were from the plane and you felt indeed it was from there. so you are in this area. has anything like this ever happened to you before. ever seen anything like this? >> no. i am grateful i have never seen anything like this before. and hopefully, hopefully, they do find more survivors. >> of course. a lot of people must be concerned in the area. what is it like for you now being in the vicinity, a resident of the area, are people

hunkering down, staying home. gathering some where. what are you seeing in the community there? >> yeah, a lot of people. i live right on the water. a lot of people have came out of their apartments and looked. the roads, it is closed. so nobody is going back there to see anything. this is kind of in line where the hudson crash happened. it is very fortunate that this happened again. >> absolutely. obviously, some situation we are following closely. also, listen, thank you for your twitter updates. really interesting to see what you have got going right there. you twitter under the name weekend oasis, right? >> i do. >> we have you weekend oasis. i am josh levs i will post links. if you have pictures, stories about what is going on and in a position to share those safely. best way, ireport.com. you can see right here. submissions we have been getting from people in the area. talking about what they are seeing. how it is a fekting people. how crowds are gathering to see

what happened. obviously right now the focus is the people and what may have happened. everyone is still hoping for the best. >> absolutely. josh, i wonder is jason with us. >> jason, still there? >> quick question for you. just wondering. you know when this wheel you saw this wheel -- come down -- did you already know about the collision? how did you have the wherewithal to take the picture? >> i have no idea what happened. i saw a big splash. heard something. my inclination if it is the wheel to a little plane, i am familiar what it looked like. then i heard the cop reporting a plane hitting a helicopter. i knew for sure it was something bad that happened. >> jason miller. thank you for being with us there. josh, thank you for the eyewitness account. just extraordinary how much people have been sharing with us about what they have seen and experienced as it pertains to the midair collision. we are getting confirmation

three pement ople on board the aircraft that likely took off from teeterboro, new jersey airport. six people possibly on the tourist helicopter that may have taken off from midtown manhattan. we are awaiting the mayor of new york, michael bloomberg, to hold a press conference. that's the location right there. live shot as soon as the mayor arrives. we'll be taking that live. - others buy the car of their dreams. - ( beeps ) during the lexus golden opportunity sales event, you can do both. introducing our best offers of the year on the vehicles intellichoice calls "the best overall value of all luxury brands." it's an opportunity today. it's a lexus forever.

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and save 50% on pads and shoes. meineke. i'm fredricka whitfield in atlanta. roughly three hours ago a midair collision took place over the hudson river. i will try to describe based on eyewitness accounts and on what the faa is confirming and new york fire department. we understand that on the hudson river, just between hoboken, new jersey, and lower manhattan, two aircrafts. one helicopter carrying six people, a tourist helicopter, collided with a small aircraft. a plane with the faa is saying three people on board. those two collided. eyewitnesses who happen to be walking in the area in buildings nearby on a beautiful day in lower manhattan saw it happen. they describe that the wing on the aircraft was simply sheered

off. a rotor may have come off the helicopter. and the two quickly descended into the water. search-and-rescue mission got under way within minutes. people were able to see that boats and helicopters, rescue helicopters got into the vicinity where this collision took place. new york police department descended divers from a helicopter into the water. they have been searching for any survivors. in all now nine people at least involved in this midair collision. we understand from the u.s. coast guard one person was rescued. again don't know the condition of the person. but an intensive search-and-rescue mission is under way. we understand the aircraft which has been described as a piper pa-32 possibly took off from teeterboro airport may be registered to a company out of philadelphia. that plane had taken off from new jersey and was on its way to ocean city, new jersey. we have with us again, a retired commercial pilot, john wily, with us earlier to give us an idea of how to p