Former MLB pitcher Halladay dies in plane crash off Florida
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Former Philadelphia Phillies’ Roy Halladay acknowledges the crowd on Aug. 8, 2014, before a baseball game against the New York Mets, in Philadelphia. Authorities have confirmed that former Major League Baseball pitcher Roy Halladay died in a small plane crash in the Gulf of Mexico off of Florida Tuesday.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Philadelphia Phillies’ Roy Halladay pitched against the New York Mets in the first inning at Citi Field in New York, in Sept. 2011. Halladay pitched six innings, giving up four hits and no runs while striking out three.
HOLIDAY, Fla. >> Roy Halladay, a two-time Cy Young Award winner who pitched a perfect game and a playoff no-hitter, died today when his private plane crashed into the Gulf of Mexico. He was 40.
Pasco County Sheriff Chris Nocco said during a news conference that Halladay’s ICON A5 went down around noon off the coast of Florida. The sheriff’s office marine unit responded to the downed plane and found Halladay’s body. No survivors were found.
Police said they couldn’t confirm if there were additional passengers on the plane or say where it was headed.
Halladay was an amateur pilot who often posted on social media about small planes. ICON aircraft had posted a video with Halladay trying out a new plane.
“We are numb over the very tragic news about Roy Halladay’s untimely death,” the Philadelphia Phillies said in a statement. “There are no words to describe the sadness that the entire Phillies family is feeling over the loss of one of the most respected human beings to ever play the game.”
He won the Cy Young Award in 2010 with the Phillies. Halladay pitched a perfect game in Miami in the 2010 regular season and a no-hitter against Cincinnati in the National League division series that year
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He retired in 2013 after 12 seasons with the Toronto Blue Jays followed by four seasons with the Phillies.
Other baseball players to die in plane crashes included Pittsburgh Pirates star Roberto Clemente in a relief mission from Puerto Rico traveling to earthquake victims in Nicaragua on New Year’s Eve in 1972; New York Yankees catcher Thurman Munson piloting his own plane near his home in Canton, Ohio, in 1979; and Yankees pitcher Cory Lidle piloting his own plane in New York City in 2006.
