Bob Simon, a veteran correspondent for US current affairs show 60 Minutes killed in car crash

Bob Simon, a veteran correspondent for US current affairs show 60 Minutes, has been killed in car crash in New York.
Simon was a passenger in livery cab which was hit by a Mercedes-Benz driven by a 23-year-old man.
The 73-year-old CBS reporter was rushed to St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital in the city where he was pronounced dead.
The New York Daily News reported that the 23-year-old driver and the driver of the livery cab were not seriously injured.

Bob Simon had been with 60 Minutes since 1998. Photo / AP
Police on the scene had to cut off the top of the Lincoln to free Simon and the driver.
The driver of the Mercedes claims the accident was the fault of the livery cab driver.
"He swerved into me," the driver told the New York Post. "He hit me and he looked like he lost control of the car."
Simon began working for CBS in 1969, working at the network's foreign bureaus until 1981 when he became the State Department correspondent.

He became the CBS News Chief Middle Eastern correspondent in 1987, and became highly respected for his work during the Iraq War, especially after he and his crew were captured in the early days of the conflict by Iraqi forces and spent 40 days in prison.
He joined the 60 Minutes team in 1998.
Anderson Cooper was one of the first to pay tribute to Simon, writing on Twitter; "#BobSimon was the best writer, in my opinion, working in broadcast news. I have admired him from the time I was a kid watching #CBSNews."
Ava DuVernay, the Selma director who was the subject of a Simon profile just this past Sunday on 60 Minutes, wrote; "Stunned. We spent time together on my 60 Minutes piece just a few weeks ago. My goodness. May God rest his soul."