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Emergency services in front of the wreckage of the glider in Wetzlar

Photo: Christoph Weiss; Laubach / dpa

A glider crashed in Wetzlar, Hesse, not far from a park and near the Lahn. As a result of the crash into the residential area, the plane broke into several parts. The pilot was killed at the scene of the accident. "It could have been much worse," says the spokesman for the Wetzlar fire department, Alexander Lotz, on site. Because in the summer Whitsun weather on Sunday afternoon, many people were out and about in the park and on a children's playground nearby or were sitting in front of their houses.

The machine first crashed into a house roof and then crashed onto one or more vehicles, according to police spokesman Guido Rehr. A motorist was injured. Although she was being treated in a hospital in Wetzlar, she escaped with minor injuries.

The pilot sat alone in the plane, the woman alone in the car. The identity of the two was not yet clear. Contrary to initial fears, however, no more people were injured. Details are to be obtained from an interview with witnesses and residents. And the Federal Bureau of Aircraft Accident Investigation has taken up the investigation, according to the German Press Agency (dpa).

A loud bang was heard in the neighborhood

A local resident reports that he was lying on the couch and suddenly heard a loud bang. "That was extreme." He had thought of a jet fighter or a gas explosion, but not of a plane crash. "It's normal for gliders to fly over here," says the neighbor. "I always see that when they start to land, they always fly over it at such an angle." Because on the other side of the Lahn, only a few hundred meters away, is the Wetzlar-Garbenheim glider airfield.

"Glider pilots are part of the daily picture in the sky here," says fire department spokesman Lotz. It was not initially known whether the pilot of the crashed aircraft was also on his way to this glider airfield or took off there.

Around 53,000 inhabitants live in the central Hessian district town of Wetzlar. After the crash, about 40 firefighters, several ambulances, a helicopter and the police were deployed.

czl/dpa