Paul Pendergrass was holding his car keys and on the way to the grocery store when he heard a big boom and felt his home shake.

"It was something I never heard before. The whole house shook. . . . That was a heck of an explosion," said Pendergrass, whose home is two blocks from the house where a plane crashed yesterday morning.

Pendergrass got in his truck and followed a big cloud of smoke that led him to the burning home at 3117 Woodsong Drive. Outside was Melissa Bowen, 22, with severe burns.

"When I first pulled out, the house was on fire, and I saw the lady laying outside the house. I jumped out, and I picked her up," the 35-year-old window contractor said. "She said, 'Give me water. Give me water.' And she said her sister was inside."

Pendergrass and a couple of other neighbors took Bowen to another sidewalk and went to the back door of the burning home. Pendergrass kicked the back door, but just as he stepped inside, dark smoke billowed and "it was so intense that it pushed me back," he said.

Bowen's sister and the home's owner, Christine M. Bowen, had left the house before the crash. She came home minutes later to find the house in flames and her sister burned, witnesses and local authorities said.

Pendergrass was treated at the scene for smoke inhalation. Battalion Chief Robert Lukhard of the Chesterfield County Fire Department said the neighbor was with the victim when emergency crews arrived.

The recently renovated home was destroyed, though some walls were still standing last night.

The aircraft was difficult to see, Pendergrass said.

"It was literally underneath the house. . . . The plane went through the foundation," he said. "You could see the crater in the ground when it went into the house."

Pendergrass' wife, Kim, said she became anxious when she heard the explosion and more nervous when she saw her husband run to the scene.

"I am mad at him and proud at the same time," she said. "I was worried of what may have happened to him."

Last night, the Pendergrasses said they heard a plane flying over their house, and it gave them the chills.

"It could have been us," Kim Pendergrass said. Her husband said he had to act.

"I just couldn't stand there and let somebody burn inside the house."
Contact Luz Lazo at (804) 649-6058 or llazo@timesdispatch.com.