Daniel Williams Ex Devil Wears Prada drummer feared dead in San Diego Cessna 550 plane crash. Beloved rocker had shared photo of him behind pilot’s control before take off, saying he was flying the Cessna 550 that had taken off NJ’s Teterboro Airport and bound for San Diego’s Montgomery-Gibbs Executive Airport before crashing.
A well known drummer who at one point was part of Christian metalcore band, ‘The Devil Wears Prada’s’ line up is feared to have died in a private jet crash that killed two people hours after he shared a photo of himself at the pilot controls.
Daniel Williams, filmed himself boarding the Cessna 550 at Teterboro Airport in New Jersey late Wednesday night.
✈️🚨 Plane Crashes Into San Diego Neighborhood — At Least 15 Homes Affected! 🔥 Smoke & Debris Everywhere pic.twitter.com/qggZstbMeq
— World War 3 (@Worldwar_3_) May 22, 2025
The drummer, 39, also shared pictures of him at the controls of the small aircraft, said that he was the ‘co-pilot now’. It’s unclear if he was joking.
A final post showed him at the plane’s controls with the caption: ‘Here we gooooo’
The plane, with a tail number of N666DS, took off from Teterboro Airport in on Wednesday at 11.15pm ET, tracking data reveals.
It stopped for fuel in Wichita, Kansas before continuing on to California, where the Cessna crashed in a quiet military neighborhood in San Diego, close to its intended final destination of Montgomery-Gibbs Executive Airport.
The plane had been due to arrive at San Diego’s Montgomery-Gibbs Executive Airport just before 4am PT, but never made it to its final destination.
Williams, 39, lived in San Diego, the intended destination of the jet. He left The Devil Wears Prada band in 2016 – and became a software engineer.
He shared a snap to his Instagram stories as he boarded the plane in the Garden State late Wednesday night.
Williams told his followers that he was flying with music agent and pilot Dave Shapiro.
On Wednesday, investigators confirmed both people on board the plane died. Eight people were injured, although investigators haven’t said if they were on the ground.
Shapiro’s friend Tony Cappocchi, a music agent, paid tribute to Shapiro, telling the dailymail: ‘Dave was a great friend of ours.’
The plane crashed just before 4am into the US military’s largest housing neighborhood. Officials say that everyone on board the luxurious plane is feared to have died in the ensuing fireball.
At least 10 houses were burned or hit by debris that spread over a wide area, and cars on both sides of a street went up in flames.
A family of five was hospitalized for smoke inhalation and another person was treated at a hospital for injuries sustained while climbing out of a window trying to flee.
Two others were treated for minor injuries at the scene.
San Diego officials haven’t released details about the plane but did confirm the flight had come in from the Midwest.
Flight tracking site FlightAware lists a Cessna Citation II jet scheduled to arrive at the Montgomery-Gibbs Executive airport in San Diego at 3.47am from the small Colonel James Jabara Airport in Wichita, Kansas.
The airport in Teterboro where the flight originated from is about 6 miles (10 kilometers) from Manhattan and is used by the rich and famous to fly in and out of NYC on private jets.
In the San Diego neighborhood, the smell of jet fuel lingered in the air hours after the crash while authorities worked to extinguish one stubborn car fire.
A small plane has slammed into a San Diego neighborhood in what officials describe as a “direct hit to multiple homes,” leaving several people on the plane dead.
The crash struck one of the largest military housing complexes in the world, home to numerous military families.… pic.twitter.com/5zsb4XvsJn
— Shadow of Ezra (@ShadowofEzra) May 22, 2025
First responders described a frightening scene in the aftermath of the crash.
‘I can’t quite put words to describe what the scene looks like, but with the jet fuel going down the street, and everything on fire all at once, it was pretty horrific to see,’ San Diego Police Chief Scott Wahl said.
More than 50 police officers responded to the scene within minutes and began evacuating homes. At least 100 residents were displaced to an evacuation center at a nearby elementary school according to a post by the San Diego Police Department.
San Diego Assistant Fire Department Chief Dan Eddy said it was very foggy at the time the private plane crashed. ‘You could barely see in front of you,’ he said.
Officials were looking into whether the plane clipped a power line before crashing into the neighborhood. The Federal Aviation Administration said the National Transportation Safety Board will lead the investigation into the plane crash.
