Bodies To Be Removed From Crash Scene

The remains of five people killed when a private jet crashed into a housing estate in Kent, are being removed today.

The Cessna light aircraft, with two pilots and three passengers on board, crashed at around 2.30pm after taking off from Biggin Hill Airport to Pau, south of France to test a Jaguar XKR race car.

Officials have named all five victims. They included ex-touring car racer David Leslie and racing team owner Richard Lloyd. The other three dead have been named as 25-year-old former student, Chris Allarton, and pilots Mike Roberts, 63 and Mike Chapman, 57. Formal identification of the dead will not happen for some time.

No one on the ground was seriously injured, but two people were treated for shock.

The house and garage that the plane crashed into are destroyed but the couple that owned the property were on holiday.

Eyewitnesses describing the scene said they saw the terrified faces of those on board just before impact.

Resident Gary Lynes said: "It's a nightmare. I heard the engines roar, it was really loud and then I heard a massive bang and looked out to see a massive ball of black smoke."

It is thought the Cessna Citation got into difficulties soon after take-off from Biggin Hill. When the aircraft was around five miles from Biggin Hill, the pilot issued a mayday call citing engine vibration. He was granted permission to return to the site for landing, around two miles north of the airport when the plane crashed.

One unnamed female witness said that the crash "was an accident waiting to happen".

"Planes fly over this estate all the time and barely skim the rooftops. We have had to cross our fingers many times that the planes would not crash into the estate."

An Air Accidents Investigation Branch spokesman said: "The AAIB inspectors are on the scene and investigating all aspects of the accident. It is not possible to speculate on the cause at this stage.

"The aircraft is registered in a private category and flight data recorders (black boxes) are not required and were not fitted. The AAIB will produce a preliminary report within 28 days."

John Sidbury, a pilot who was landing another plane at Biggin Hill, heard the mayday call.

He said: "You could hear the alarms in the cockpit.

"The pilot came back over the radio a second or two later and said 'We're going down, we're going down.'

"The radio stayed live, and I turned off the runway I looked back and I saw the plane basically drop out of the sky."

Residents have laid floral tributes at the scene and praised the actions of the two pilots. John Rainer, 45, of Petts Wood said: "It appears the pilot did everything he could to avoid the houses.

"He could have hit the houses and my whole family could have been completely obliterated. I'm just grateful to him for his actions - the plane could have taken out this whole street."

His wife Melissa, 33, added: "We're grateful to the pilot for avoiding the majority of the estate and saving the lives of many children and families."

(DS/JM)