THEATER: With his zany imagination and distinctive bass-baritone voice, Joseph Keckler (myspace) has been generating buzz throughout the gooey honeycomb of the downtown performance art cabaret scene. Tonight he sprinkles his particular blend of whimsical catnip at Dixon Place with Cat Lady, in which a man re-enacts an ordinary day with his mother, who runs a community theater with cat actors out of her home. “Past lives are recalled, songs are sung, and finally a......

If you want to feel a little uncomfortable about how the Federal Aviation Administration is doing its job, read today's NY Times story about a near-miss at LaGuardia. Two weeks ago, a Comair Delta 50-seater and a Delta 737 were within a "few hundred feet" of colliding. A trainee had allowed the smaller plane to cross the runway, just as the 737 was descending to the very same one:As the 737, Flight 1238, rolled down......

A helicopter on an aerial tour of New York City crashed into the Hudson River yesterday afternoon. Luckily none of the eight people - seven passenger and a pilot - were injured. The Liberty Travel helicopter had only been in the air for a couple minutes, after leaving West 30th Street, before experiencing engine problems. According to the Post, chopper was "able to make a controlled landing then stay afloat using emergency inflatable pontoons."......

The National Transportation Safety Board issued its final report on the Yankees pitcher Cory Lidle's Cirrus plane crash into an Upper East Side building. From the NTSB: "The probable cause of a small airplane crash in Manhattan last October was the pilots' inadequate planning, judgment, and airmanship in the performance of a 180-degree turn maneuver inside of a limited turning space." The NTSB found no problems with the plane itself, and suggested that the plane......

Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a bank robbery at 59-23 Main St. in Queens, a partial collapse of a house being renovated in Wingate, Brooklyn, and a pedestrian was struck at Clove Rd. and Victory Blvd. on Staten Island. The idiot fan arrested at a Mets game the other week plead guilty to attempting to blind Braves players with a high-powered flashlight. His sentence: 15 days in jail and a three two-year ban from......

The National Transportation Safety Board released information about the October plane crash into an Upper East Side Building. It turns out that before the crash, the Yankees pitcher Cory Lidle, had only spent four hours flying his new plane, a Cirrus SR20. He had only 12.5 hours of actual flight time in that model, and a total of 88 hours flying time (48 hours as a "pilot in command"). Lidle's flight instructor Tyler Stanger......

The National Transportation Safety Board released an update to its investigation into the October 11 plane crash carrying Yankees pitcher Cory Lidle and his flight instructor Tyler Stanger. It appears that the turn the plane was trying to make was too tight, and the wind may also have caused an issue when the plane crashed into the East 72nd Street apartment building. From the NTSB: Radar data indicate that the airplane was flying over......

More than two years after the Anthony J. Barberi ferry crashed into wood pilings at the Staten Island Ferry's St. George Ferry Terminal, the ferry's pilot and supervisor were sentenced to prison yesterday. Assistant Captain Richard J. Smith, the pilot, was sentenced to 18 months and ferry supervisor Patrick Ryan was sentenced to 366 days. Smith had been tired and was on various medications during the crash; shortly after, he tried to kill himself. He......

Three Australian tourists who survived Monday's helicopter crash in the East River spoke to the media yesterday. Greg Fisher, Taryn Fay, and Mary Johnston explained what they went through, saying the seat belts were hard to unbuckle in the water. They even said they loved New York, even though the NY Times noted that they only did so "with sufficient prodding"; they were tightlipped about whether or not they had retained lawyers to, perhaps, sue......