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Plane evacuation slide falls into backyard of Chicago home

CHICAGO (WGN) — Federal authorities are investigating after a plane’s emergency evacuation slide fell into the backyard of a Chicago home on Monday.

Chicago police say they were called to the city’s northwest side near O’Hare International Airport Monday afternoon where they found the slide had slightly damaged a home.


“They were just having lunch upstairs in our unit and they just heard a loud boom and I guess it hit the side of the building,” said Patrick Devitt, a neighbor of the home where the plane debris fell. “The only thing that we were worried about at the beginning was like, oh yeah, it’s real loud, stuff like that and you get used to it, but you never think that something like that is going to happen.”

After officers arrived, the slide was moved out in front of the home into the street, where it was taken from the scene.

No injuries have been reported from the incident.

According to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), maintenance workers at O’Hare discovered an emergency evacuation slide was missing from a United Airlines Boeing 767 that had just landed safely after a flight from Zurich, Switzerland sometime Monday afternoon.

United said it was seeking to find out exactly how the slide ended up in the neighborhood.

“We immediately contacted the FAA and are working with our team to better understand the circumstances around this matter,” United said in a statement.

The FAA is continuing to investigate the incident, and no other information is available at this time.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.