Dutch Safety Board to help investigate small plane crash in England; Witnesses shocked

The Dutch Safety Board (OVV) will assist in the investigation into the accident involving a small Dutch plane near London Southend airport on Sunday. Plane spotters reported waving to the plane’s pilots minutes before the crash.

The plane went down and exploded at around 4:00 p.m. on Sunday. The authorities have still not said anything about how many people were on board and whether there were any survivors. The plane, operated by the Dutch company Zeusch Aviation, was bound for Lelystad Airport.

The British Air Accidents Investigation Branch is leading the investigation, a spokesperson for the OVV told the news wire ANP. No OVV investigators will go to the site in England, but the OVV will “assist with any questions the British ask.”

The pilots of the plane, a Beechcraft B200 Super King Air, waved at the plane spotters waiting outside the airport as it taxied past, plane spotter Johnson, who was there with his 8-year-old son and 5-year-old daughter, told RTL Nieuws. “Both pilots waved politely to the families watching from outside the fence. For us plane spotters, and especially for the children, that’s really nice. You bond with each other for that moment.”

It was an “unreal sight” when the plane went down a few minutes later, exploding at its impact with the ground. “My son is a plane fanatic; this is even his favorite plane. Then you suddenly see it go wrong… that enormous blaze… everyone was in shock. You could hear everyone gasping for breath. People were screaming.”

According to Johnson, the plane made an unusual maneuver. “Shortly after the plane took off, it started banking to the left,” he told RTL Nieuws. “That’s a lot faster than usual. Normally, they gain altitude before turning, but now he was only at about 100 meters. The left bank continued, an dhe lost more and more altitude, until the plane nose dived into the ground and exploded. It must have been 600 meters away from us. He was even still inside the airport fence.”