Thaindian News

New Delhi, May 26 (IANS) Seven people, including two pilots, were killed when an air ambulance with a critically ill patient on board, crashed in Faridabad on the outskirts of the national capital late Wednesday night, barely minutes before it was to land here, police and aviation officials said. Two people died on the ground.

The Pilatus PC-12 single-engined turbo-prop aircraft was flying to the capital from Patna, rushing a seriously-ill patient for specialised medical treatment when the crash occurred at 10.50 p.m., five minutes after it lost contact with the Air Traffic Control at Delhi airport, aviation officials said.

Nine people, including two on the ground, were killed in the crash, B.S. Sandhu, Haryana’s additional director general of police, told IANS in Chandigarh.

Only three bodies were recovered till 12.30 a.m., Additional Deputy Commissioner (Faridabad) Anita Yadav said.

The aircraft was descending from 8,000 feet when it went off the ATC radar, an official said

The plane crashed into two houses in a thickly populated area of Delhi’s suburban town and 20 fire tenders were rushed to the spot to aid in the rescue operations, Haryana police chief Ranjiv Dalal told IANS in Chandigarh.

Flames billowed from the houses as residents of the area rushed to clear the debris. Mangled remains of the aircraft were littered all over the area.

An eyewitness told a TV news channel that he was on the roof of his house as he usually “stargazed” at night when he noticed a plane flying “sideways” instead of straight in heavy wind conditions.

According to an ATC official, “apart from the difficulty of operating a single-engined aircraft, doing so in heavy wind conditions can cause a disaster. In heavy wind conditions, the backdraft from the wind hitting the tail can make the aircraft unstable and cause it to nosedive”.

The aircraft, registeration number VT-ACF, was being operated by Air Charter Services India. The aircraft was manufactured in 2005.