Kathleen Caronna
Kathleen Caronna (born 1964) is an investment analyst and New York City resident who became well-known due to her involvement in two accidents that came to national attention in a nine-year span.
On Thanksgiving Day, 1997, while attending the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade with her husband, Ignazio Massimo, and then-infant son, Caronna was seriously injured when high winds pushed the Cat in the Hat balloon into a lamppost. Debris from the accident fractured Caronna's skull and left her in a coma for a month; she later sued the city for nearly $400 million and received an undisclosed settlement.
On October 11, 2006, a small plane carrying New York Yankees baseball pitcher Cory Lidle crashed into Caronna's 41st-floor home in the Belaire Apartments on Manhattan's Upper East Side. Although the plane's engine landed in her bedroom, Caronna was unhurt, as she was not home at the time.
The high-profile nature of the accidents led to changes in guidelines governing the use of parade balloons in high winds and the piloting of aircraft under visual flight rules along the East River general aviation corridor.