Four people died, Saturday, October 10, in the collision of two aircraft: an ULM which carried two people, and a small tourist plane which had three, in Loches (Indre-et-Loire).
The fifth passenger is still wanted.
"A small ULM carrying two people and a DR 400 type tourist plane carrying three people telescoped around 4:30 p.m. to 5 p.m., the first landing on the fence of a house in Loches, without causing any additional victim , the second several hundred meters away in an uninhabited area, "Nadia Seghier, secretary general of the prefecture of Indre-et-Loire, told AFP.
"The small ULM crashed rue Aristide Briand, (less than two kilometers from downtown Loches, Editor's note) and the tourist plane in the Haut-Jarry sector, a little on the outskirts of the town, no far from the water tower, ”she said.
One of the people on board "has not been found"
According to the public prosecutor of Tours, Grégoire Dulin, "two bodies were found in the ULM and two others in the plane".
"A person who would have fallen, undoubtedly from the plane, was not found," he added, adding that the plane had crashed into a tree in a place difficult to access.
"The pilot of the plane is 75 years old, his two passengers 28 and 30 years old. The pilot of the ULM is 66 years old and his passenger 50 years old", specified Grégoire Dulin, adding that there was "no of family relationship "between these people.
The prefecture had previously reported five deaths.
In Loches, collision between a small tourist plane and an ULM.
The balance sheet shows 5 people dead.
50 firefighters and 30 gendarmes on site to secure and carry out the investigation.
The causes of the collision are not yet determined.
- Prefect of Indre-et-Loire (@ Prefet37) October 10, 2020
According to the prosecutor, the ULM took off from Châtellerault (Vienne) at 3.15 p.m. with two passengers on board, and the Robin DR 400 aircraft from Poitiers at 3 p.m.
Their occupants took advantage of a clear sky to fly over the castles of the Loire.
"At this time, there is therefore uncertainty about the number of victims, four safe and a fifth probable," added Grégoire Dulin.
An investigation has been opened for manslaughter.
It was entrusted to the gendarmerie brigade of transport of Roissy and Brest, as well as to the group of gendarmerie of Indre-et-Loire.
"A big boom"
A psychological cell has been activated and the families of the victims are expected in the evening in Loches.
About fifty firefighters were mobilized as well as about thirty gendarmes.
The search was still continuing at 9:30 p.m. The reasons for the collapse are still unknown.
According to testimony collected by AFP, firefighters, "criminal identification technicians" were on site to identify the bodies.
According to this source, the ULM would have landed on the electric meter of the house where it would have caught fire.
The occupants of the house on which the ULM crashed were not there at the time of the accident.
It is a residential area bordered by a busy road, south of the city center.
"I heard a big boom and then shortly after the sirens," said Robert, a neighbor of the ULM crash site, who did not see the aircraft.
Just overhanging, Geneviève Allouard-Liebert was in her courtyard when she heard "like a big shock" with her husband, then saw a man fall from the plane into a meadow, falling several tens of meters.
The aircraft was flying close to homes, they said.
"It's an improbable and incredible accident in the sky over Loches, where there is never any air traffic," reacted Marc Angenault, mayor of Loches.
According to the chosen one, the low sun of the late afternoon may have dazzled one of the pilots.
“The bodies are damaged,” he added, adding that the plane crashed “far from inhabited areas, in a wood”.
The house of associations of Loches was opened to receive the bodies of the victims and to constitute a funeral chapel there.
With AFP
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