Probe launched into deadly skydiver plane crash
PR dla Zagranicy
John Beauchamp
06.07.2014 14:00
Prosecutors and members of the State Commission for Plane Crash Investigations (PKBWL) have arrived at the village of Topolow, near the south-central city of Czestochowa, after eleven people died in a skydiving plane crash, Saturday.
The site of the Piper Navajo crash in Topolów near Częstochowa, Saturday 05.07.2014. Photo: PAP/Waldemar Deska
The site of the Piper Navajo crash in Topolów near Częstochowa, Saturday 05.07.2014. Photo: PAP/Waldemar Deska
Out of the twelve passengers travelling in the Piper Navajo light aircraft, only one man survived the crash on Saturday afternoon.
As of Sunday the lone survivor, aged around 40 according to reports, is said to be in a stable condition and may be transferred from intensive care to a general surgery ward.
It is not known when prosecutors will be able to interview the man, however.
The crash happened after the plane had taken off from the Rudniki airfield and was carrying members of a private parachute school before bursting into flames after hitting the ground shortly after take-off.
Spokesman for the District Prosecution in Czestochowa, Tomasz Ozimek said that investigators are to analyse the remains of the crash.
“I don’t think that this task will be completed on Sunday, probably Monday or Tuesday,” he informed, adding that the crash remains will not be cleared before all investigations have taken place at the site.
Autopsies of the plane crash victims are to get under way on Monday, including DNA tests, prosecutors have said. Even though the identities of the victims are known, prosecutors have withheld any detailed information, stating only that the passengers come from the southern Silesia and Malopolska regions, as well as the central Lodz province.
Cause unknown
While the cause of the air catastrophe is not yet known, one aviation expert has mooted that the accident might have been caused by the plane’s engines overheating or from a shift in the plane’s centre of gravity.
Speaking to state broadcaster TVP Info, aviation expert Grzegorz Brychczynski underlined that if one engine had failed, the remaining engine should have provided enough power to land safely.
He also suggested, however, that the passengers might not have been wearing seatbelts and could have caused the centre of gravity to change in the airplane, which could have had disastrous consequences if the plane was shortly after take-off.
Brychczynski added that high temperatures seen across the southern region over the weekend could have also had an adverse effect on the engines. (jb)
Source: PAP/TVP Info