A 1940s plane once used by Haitian dictator Papa Doc Duvalier has crash-landed near Seattle.
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The Boeing
Stratolinersits half submerged with the Seattle skyline in the background Photo: Reuters
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The only Boeing 307
Stratoliner
still in existence came down near West Seattle, across Elliott Bay.
It is now owned by the Smithsonian Institution. All four people aboard were rescued safely.
The four men were standing on the plane's wings when rescuers arrived from a nearby Coastguard station.
The plane began to sink, although rescue boats towed it closer to shore. It came to rest in 60 feet of water with its nose and wings underwater and its tail in the air.
Officials at Seattle's Museum of Flight identified the plane as a 1940s-era Stratoliner, the first commercial plane with a pressurised cabin. It can hold 33 passengers and a crew of five.