Birmingham Airport plane crash blamed on fog
12.08.11
A plane carrying a donor liver flew into an antenna as it came in to land at Birmingham Airport in thick fog, the Air Accident Investigation Branch has said. The Cessna jet was flying in from Belfast, but hit a 50ft-high flight-guiding antenna on November 19 last year, then crash landed in the grass verge by the runway and caught fire. The captain was trapped in the cockpit and used an extinguisher to cope with the flames around him. The undamaged liver was rescued from the wreckage and was successfully transplanted.
Fire crews ‘could not immediately locate the accident site’ because the fog was so thick, the report said. Firefighters were on the scene within three minutes, extinguished the fire and helped to free the captain and rescued the donor liver bound for Birmingham's Queen Elizabeth Hospital. It had been flown from Belfast International Airport for a patient who was in a critical condition awaiting a transplant.
Witnesses said the weather was ‘extremely unusual, both for the sharp delineation between the fog and the area of clear visibility, with blue sky and sunshine, and for the speed with which the fog engulfed the airfield. The 58-year-old captain was treated for multiple serious injuries and the co-pilot, who managed to escape, had only minor injuries.
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