RIDGEFIELD -- Bhupen Patel was worried that a bigger plane could have crashed onto his neighbors' lawn.
He is concerned about the amount of air traffic and the size of the planes that have been flying over his neighborhood.
On Oct. 1, about 10 minutes after taking off from Danbury Municipal Airport, pilot Richard Baldwin crashed his plane onto the front lawn of Michael and Stacey Lockard's home -- about six-tenths of a mile from the end of the airport runway -- according to Ridgefield Fire Chief Heather Burford.
Baldwin, a Ridgefield resident, was released from the hospital last week, Burford said.
Burford said Monday the cause of the accident is still undetermined. Federal Aviation Administration officials told her that an investigation would take at least two weeks from the time of the crash, she said. The National Transportation Safety Board would report the final results, Burford said.
Patel was one of many neighbors from Ridgefield and Danbury who stood around the yellow caution tape that surrounded the Lockards' property on Briar Ridge Road after the plane crashed. He watched as emergency crews inspected the plane, which was covered in leaves and debris.
Patel and the Lockards live in a residential neighborhood with lots of trees and large homes. More than half of the homes in the area were built between 1950 and 1990, and have estimated values from $200,000 to $400,000, according to Homes.com.
Patel said the airplane could have fallen in his yard instead of his neighbors'.
"It missed my house by about 200 feet," he said.
Patel has lived in his home for 25 years, and there have been several plane crashes in the mile-and-a half radius area in that time, he said.
Jaclyn Giovannone, a Cel Bret Drive resident, said she believes the plane crash was a freak accident.
"I just think that was an isolated event," she said.
Before Giovannone moved to her house about a year-and-a-half ago, she lived near the Westchester County Airport in White Plains, N.Y.
"She follows airports," said her father, Michael Castaldo, of Staten Island, N.Y.
Burford said she's worked for the fire department for five years, and has not seen a plane crash in the area.
"This is the first incident like this that I've been involved with," she said. "It's fairly infrequent."
Danbury Airport administrator Paul Estefan also said after the Oct. 1 crash that such accidents are a rare occurrence.
But the neighbors said crashes happen about every five years.
"I've lived here 28 years and about five planes went down," said Mario Diacri, who lives three doors down from the Lockards.
Some of the crashes have been on Backus Avenue and Pine Mountain Road, he said.
The NTSB listed seven nonfatal airplane accidents dating back to 1992 on its website, not including the Oct. 1 accident.
Patel said there seems to have been an increase in the number of planes going over his home. The planes have also gotten bigger and their loud engines bother him, he said.
A report from Danbury Municipal Airport, however, indicate that the number of flights has decreased in recent years.
In 2008, the total number of planes departing from and arriving to Danbury Airport was 83,419. The following year the total decreased by about 10,000. In 2010, there were 77,541 and in 20011, though July there were 38,415 flights, according to Danbury Municipal Airport officials.
From 1976 through 2002, more than 110,000 planes a year took off from or landed in Danbury, the airport reported.
The airport is about a mile from the neighborhood of the latest crash, said Kevin McCarthy, a neighbor who lives on Cel Bret Drive in Danbury. He lives across the street from where the plane crashed and helped Baldwin get out of the plane.
"They go over all the time," McCarthy said, nonchalantly. "You don't even pay attention to them, because you hear them."
Bernadette Reilly, another Cel Bret Drive resident, said living near the airport has not created any problems for her.
"I'm happy with the airport," Reilly said.
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