A pilot was killed and a woman trainee pilot was injured as a brand-new training aircraft belonging to a private aviation academy crashed in a remote field near Chopda village in Maharashtra’s Jalgaon on Friday, officials said.
The incident occurred around 4 p.m. when the light training aircraft suddenly came crashing down, killing the pilot instantly and injuring the student, even as horrified villagers informed the police and district authorities.
The victims have been identified as pilot Narul Amin, and the trainee pilot Ankita Gujar, who suffered fractures in the crash which reduced the aircraft to a heap of metal.
The aircraft belonged to the NMIMS Academic of Aviation, linked with the reputed Shri Vile Parle Kelavani Mandal (SVPKM)’s group of educational institutions in Mumbai.
“It’s a very unfortunate incident The aircraft was a very new one and had got its certificate barely six months ago. The pilot was very senior and experienced. Something must have gone wrong somewhere,” SVPKM President Amrish Patel told IANS.
Patel, who is a BJP legislator, said that the aviation academy is shifting the injured woman to Mumbai’s Nanavati Hospital, Vile Parle, for treatment of her fractures.