Winnipeg, Manitoba ? Bystanders rushed to help screaming passengers after a Piper Navajo airplane carrying six Americans five of them Kansans slammed into a busy Winnipeg intersection, smashing into cars and narrowly missing a gas station.

All aboard the plane the six tourists coming back from a fishing trip and the Canadian pilot were injured, but no injuries were reported on the ground despite the cars and trucks damaged in the Tuesday morning crash.

Keystone Air Services Ltd. president Cliff Arlt identified the passengers as Stephen Jones, 57, his nephew Blake Floodman and friend Ed Heene, 56, all from Emporia, Kan., along with Jones’s father, Chester, 79, of Wichita, Kan.; Robert Haddorff, 57, of Eden Prairie, Minn.; and Bradley Hofmeister of Stanley, Kan.

The elder Jones was hospitalized in critical condition with several broken bones and fractures, while the others were in serious condition with similar injuries, according to news reports.

They were fishermen who flew on a Keystone plane to a remote Manitoba lodge a few hundred miles north of Winnipeg. Arlt said the pilot, whose name was not released, did what he could to minimize the impact of the crash.

“He put it the only place he could I guess,” Arlt said.

Winnipeg Police Constable Bob Johnson said a much bigger disaster would have occurred if the plane had veered a few yards to either side.

“If it had of hit the gas station or right in the middle of the intersection, God knows,” Johnson said.

Witnesses said the plane had descended suddenly and somehow missed the rows of houses and buildings, including a gas station, before crashing into vehicles at a busy intersection and stopping in a parking lot.

“We started putting out the fires, did whatever we could to help,” said Brett Tocher, who works at the Co-op gas station just yards from where the aircraft crashed and heard survivors screaming for help. “The one guy, he was trying to drag himself out. He wasn’t saying anything but you could tell he was in pain.”

The aircraft sliced open the cargo bay of a meat delivery van but narrowly missed the cab, where the driver was seated. It also hit other vehicles, but police said the only injuries on the ground were minor scrapes.

An initial report on the crash by Transport Canada said the pilot had radioed the Winnipeg International Airport tower to report mechanical problems.

The plane attempted to land at the airport, but was too high on the first approach, the report said. Rod Ridley of Transport Canada said investigators would check if the plane ran out of fuel.