Hyderabad, March 03: An aircraft of the Indian Navy’s ‘Sagar Pawan’ acrobatics team crashed into a residential area in Hyderabad on Wednesday. The pilot and the co-pilot are feared dead, while 2-4 people were injured on the ground.
Navy Chief Nirmal Verma while confirming the mishap identified the pilots as Cdr Suresh Maurya and Lt Cdr Rahul Nair.
Their Kiran MK-II plane was part of a team of four aircrafts which were flying in formation and performing daring maneuvers in a display at the India Aviation show, when it suddenly swirled off from its normal route and crashed into a building in Bowenpally area of the old city – located near the Begumpet Airport.
As per initial reports, the pilot was unable to pull up from a dive and went into a spiral as the planes were breaking away from the formation and going at different directions.
Witnesses said they heard a loud boom, after which the plane went down. A thick cloud of smoke rose to the sky near the Begumpet airport following the accident.
Giving details about the shocking mishap, the Director General of Police RR Girish Kumar said that the pilot and the co-pilot of the aircraft died in the crash while two people – residents of the building into which the aircraft crashed – were injured.
The rescue operations are slow as the three-storey building into which the aircraft crashed is located in a narrow alley, thereby making it difficult for the fire engines and other rescuers to access the crash site.
Meanwhile, the Navy has ordered a probe into the incident.
Andhra Chief Minister K Rosiah and Union Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel were present at the Begumpet Airport – the venue of the air show – at the time of the incident.
The Kiran MK-II – designed and manufactured by Hindustan Aeronautics Limited – is a trainer aircraft and was homed at the Goa naval base.
—-Agencies