A seaplane pilot and his passenger had to be rescued from the East River Saturday in Queens after their craft briefly took off — but then crashed after it was struck by a wave which cracked the windshield, the pilot and authorities said.
The aircraft was near Riverside Drive and 158th St. in Whitestone, near the Throggs Neck Bridge, when the incident happened around 9:20 a.m., an FDNY spokesman said.
A private boater who was nearby rescued the two people, who were not seriously hurt, from the plane, officials said.
“I was taking off and I hit a big wave and the windshield cracked,” pilot Giuseppe Oppedisano told The Post, adding the plane started taking on water.
Oppedisano, 67, owns the popular Il Bacco restaurant in Little Neck, Queens, and is the same pilot who was at the controls in October 2020 during a fatal crash that killed a woman and left three others hurt.
During that crash six years ago, witnesses said the plane was traveling fast along the water when it hit a pier, which cracked the plane in two, according to official.
A National Transportation Safety Board investigation listed poor pilot judgment as the cause of the tragedy.
Oppedisano was left in critical condition after that crash and had to undergo 10 surgeries.
He lives near the spot where his plane crashed and keeps the craft in a hangar behind his Riverside Drive mansion, official have said in the past.
