arrival of ntsb and other agencies. police commissioner jimmy o neil. thanks, mr. mayor. at 1:43 this afternoon, the first 911 calls came in reporting a crash at a fire atop 787 7th avenue, right across the street, and that s a 54-story office building. emergency personnel responded as dan nigro said very quickly and fdny personnel put out the fire. we have one fatality, an individual that is believed to be the pilot of a privately owned helicopter. at approximately 1:32 this afternoon, the helicopter took off at the 34th street heliport and about 11 minutes later crashed across the street from where we are now. right now, the fbi are working with the faa and the ntsb to gather additional info on the pilot, we believe we ve tentatively identified the aircraft, the flight path, and its owner.
those sort of out of place noises. so that s definitely why i looked up. and, you know, your first thoughts are for the safety of the people in the building or on the ground. so that was what i was sort of looking to see. obviously back to that day and the terror and horror of wondering what was happening to people. lance, i appreciate your time. thank you so much. of course, thank you. and i want to go now to miles o brien, aviation analyst. so, miles, from what we know here, 34th street heliport on one side of manhattan, going down as you should. because you re not allowed to go over the middle in part because of the trump tower restricted zone and veering in totally restricted airspace and then crash landing. what do you make of it? well, if you go by that video which evidently is the video we ll put that up.
the two of them spoke. rick leventhal is here with more. the nypd commissioner confirmed one fatality and they were trying to determine where the flight took off from. he thought it originaled from the east side. i have another source with the joint terrorism task force that tells me not terrorism, the crash was not terrorism but the pilot did take off from the 34th street heliport from the east side. the source says the flight was scheduled to go to the statue of liberty when it experienced mechanical failure. the pilot, as you reported, tried to make the emergency landing at seventh avenue on the rooftop of the building. there was a crash and that pilot, according to multiple sources is deceased. again, no terrorism. this appeared to be a flight that originated from the 34th street heliport on the east side of manhattan.
but the point is in those conditions both the pilot and the aircraft have to be certified for flight in ifr conditions. here we have a situation where a pilot was flying quite possibly above the clouds, because at that point the cloud line was between 700 and 800 feet. the roof building is 752 feet. tom, the math just doesn t add up on this. it s quite possible if that pilot wasn t in the clouds, he was close to the clouds. ali, i have a little bit of a development here. a senior government official now confirming to nbc news that this pilot did in fact leave the 34th street heliport, so we don t know why again he was trafficking or where he was going but he did a government official confirms he did leave the 34th street heliport. one other point i would make and
787 p seventh avenue which is across the street, it s a 50 story office building. emergency personnel responded as dan said very quickly and fdny personnel put out the fire. we have one confirmed death, and the individual is believed to be the owner of the helicopter. we know at 1:32 this afternoon, the helicopter took off from the 34th street heliport and 11 minutes later crashed on the roof of the building across the street. right now we re working with the faa and ntsb to gather additional info on the pilot. we tentatively identified the aircraft, the flight path and its owner. that s it preliminarily. we ll take a few questions. you said it was a privately