'Inexperienced' pilot 'lost control of aircraft' before fatal plane crash at airfield
Investigators have said a pilot, killed alongside his passenger when his plane nosedived into the ground at an airfield last summer, is thought to have lost control of the aircraft.
The Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB) found it took just six seconds between pilot Christopher Ingle performing his final manoeuvre at the controls of the EV-97 Eurostar, a two-seat light sport aircraft, and it crashing shortly after take-off at Otherton Airfield, near Penkridge, in June last year.
Investigators said the 56-year-old had not suffered any medical issues, and there were not any obvious faults with the plane, but described him as 'relatively inexperienced' and said he might have been unable to rescue the situation when the plane began spinning to the ground.
Conditions at12.57pm on June 4 were favourable for flying, but shortly after take-off the small plane went into a spin and crashed into a container on the ground, killing Mr Ingle and 63-year-old passenger Graham Jones.
The report said: "The left-wing had struck the top of a metal shipping container and separated from the rest of the aircraft, which came to rest alongside.
"The fuel tank was split open and there had been a post-crash fire that consumed parts of the aircraft; no fuel remained in the tank."
