Military Fighter Jet Crash In San Diego Neighborhood

A military fighter jet crashed near a school and a busy highway in a densely populated San Diego neighborhood Monday, destroying two homes and killing two people.  The pilot of the F/A-18D Hornet jet ejected safely, according to a statement from Marine Corps Air Station Miramar.

The plane crashed near Interstate 805 around noon Monday as it prepared to land at the base, said Ian Gregor, a Federal Aviation Administration spokesman. The crash occurred two miles away.

Traffic kept flowing on I-805, the California Highway Patrol said. Students at nearby University City High School were kept locked in classrooms, but there was no damage to the campus and no one was injured, said Barbara Prince, a school secretary.

Two houses were destroyed and one damaged, the Marine base statement said.

At a news conference in the University City community where the crash occurred, San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders said it was believed that four people — “possibly a grandmother, a mother and two children” — were in the destroyed house where firefighters found two bodies.

The other two people believed to be in that house were missing, and firefighters were searching through the rubble, Sanders said.  The other house hit by the plane apparently was unoccupied at the time, he said.