A skydiving plane crashes in Tomblaine, France, killing 11 people
Warning: Graphic content
Tomblaine, France: Families watched in shock as a skydiving plane that was expected to be a thrilling introduction to skydiving crashed in northeastern France on Sunday, killing all 11 people on board, officials said.
Interior Minister Laurent Nunez said the dead included five parachute instructors, five novice jumpers and pilots. Transport Minister Philippe Tabarot said it was the worst aviation accident involving parachuting in France in nearly 30 years.
“Some of the victims’ families witnessed the plane crash with their own eyes. So there is a tremendous amount of emotion and even greater psychological trauma,” Nunez said.
He declined to speculate on what caused the crash but said the plane suddenly fell from the sky. He said the plane had just taken off from Nancy-Essey airport on the outskirts of the city of Nancy and touched down about 300 meters down the runway.
Yves Séguy, governor of the Meurthe-et-Moselle region, said the plane suffered a malfunction and “fell almost vertically”, narrowly missing a residential area.
“If the incident had occurred only a few dozen meters away, the accident could have caused secondary casualties,” he said.
The plane banked to the left after takeoff and crashed near homes less than a minute later, according to flight tracking service Flightradar24.
Police cordoned off the crumpled wreckage.
Flight tracking sites identified the plane as a single-engine Pilatus PC-6, a small cargo, passenger and paratroop carrier.
Nancy Mayor Mathieu Klein told public broadcaster France Info that the paratroopers would jump in tandem. Tandem jumps are skydiving experiences in which two people, usually an instructor and a novice jumper, are strapped together for the descent.
Officials said emergency services responded immediately and provided psychological support to the victims’ relatives. Nunez said that the Paris prosecutor’s office is conducting the accident investigation.
A resident identified by BFM-TV as John Curaku told the broadcaster he was in his yard when he heard what sounded like a plane engine shutting down, followed immediately by an explosion.
He said he went to the crash site and found “there were no signs of life” and that the two bodies were thrown a few meters away from the plane.
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