Pilot in NJ crash a longtime Rockland volunteer

The pilot who crash-landed a small Coast Guard plane in New Jersey is a tireless Rockland volunteer and deeply religious man who fought to join the Coast Guard Auxiliary after the organization initially prohibited him from wearing his skullcap in uniform.

Yakov Rosenberg of Spring Valley suffered serious injuries in the crash Thursday in Cresskill but is expected to recover. He underwent surgery on both of his broken legs Thursday evening at Hackensack University Medical Center, friends said Friday.

Rosenberg, who also goes by Jack, is a lifelong Rockland resident and member of the Viznitz Hasidic sect who is known for going out of his way to help others.

"All his good deeds came back to him," said Rabbi Mayer Berger, operations director for Chesed Shel Emes, a Brooklyn-based group that dispatches planes and helicopters to help Jewish families retrieve sick or injured relatives and comply with religious burial laws. "It's a miracle."

Rosenberg was surveying the Hudson River for the Coast Guard Auxiliary, a volunteer organization that helps the Coast Guard's efforts to promote recreational boating safety He was initially thwarted from serving when he applied in 2006 even though he passed all the tests because regulations banned him from wearing a yarmulke, a traditional skullcap worn by Jewish men.

Lawmakers, including Assemblyman Dov Hikind,D-Brooklyn, intervened and convinced the Coast Guard to change its policy, allowing Rosenberg to join.

Rosenberg, who has a tire business, is a certified pilot and volunteers for Chesed Shel Emes, which was founded by his brother, Mendy. He won wide praise in 2011 when he flew a helicopter to take food and medicine to a group of observant Jews stranded in Killington, Vermont, after roads were washed away by Hurricane Irene.

He has also been a member of Chaverim, a service organization in Monsey, since it was started in 1999. His wife works as a dispatcher for the same group. The couple has several children.

"He gets up in the middle of the night to help someone change a tire or give a boost to a dead battery," said Chaverim coordinator Josef Margaretten. "If someone is lost or a child is locked in a car, he's the first to volunteer."

Rosenberg was piloting the single-engine, four-seat plane when he radioed that he was experiencing engine trouble shortly after 4:30 p.m. Thursday.

He was trying to make an emergency landing at Teterboro airport when he crash-landed at 4:44 p.m. in a recreational field, away from homes in the suburban Bergen County neighborhood. The sole passenger, a man from Setauket, New York, was also seriously injured and is expected to recover.

The Cessna 172 crash-landed in a field behind the Cresskill Swim Club, NBC 4 New York reported.

The cause of the crash has not been determined. The National Transportation Safety Board is conducting an investigation and will interview Rosenberg and the passenger as soon as they are well enough, said spokesman Peter Knudson. Officials from the Federal Aviation Administration have already visited the crash site.

Rosenberg's wife and children are at Hackensack Medical Center, accompanied by members of the Coast Guard, Chaverim and Chesed Shel Emes, who are providing support. They are marveling that Rosenberg and his passenger survived and no one on the ground was injured.

“He would put himself in danger so he wouldn’t hurt anyone else,” Margaretten said. “We're so proud of him.”