Dec. 16, 1960: The wreckage of a jet airline fell on the “once-fashionable Park Slope area” at Sterling Place and Seventh Avenue, after two planes bound for New York International Airport (today’s J.F.K.) and La Guardia Airport collided in midair. The second plane crashed on Staten Island; it was conjectured that the planes flew into each other there. One-hundred thirty-four people died, and the United DC-8 narrowly missed crashing into a school that was in session with “more than 1,000 children” in classes. It was the worst air disaster in history up to that point. The next day in Munich, there was another instance of a plane crashing into a busy metro area, with 52 people, including 19 Americans, killed.
