Pilot, Passenger Dead As Small Plane Crash-lands On Major Highway

Dutch emergency services reported that a small plane crashed on a highway in the Netherlands on Wednesday, killing the pilot and spreading debris across the dual carriageway.

The accident happened in broad daylight at around 12:45 pm (1045 GMT) near the southern city of Breda, about 60 kilometres (38 miles) south of Rotterdam.

“A plane crashed on the A58 from Breda in the direction of Roosendaal,” the Middle-West Brabant Safety Region said on its website.

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“Unfortunately the pilot, the only person on board, died,” it said, without disclosing the type of plane.

No other injuries were reported.

Images posted on X showed a burned-out wreck and debris on the highway, where traffic had been blocked off by emergency services from both sides.

A logo of a local aviation flight school could be spotted on the wreckage, local broadcaster Omroep Brabant said.

“I suddenly saw something descend. It was the plane,” an unidentified witness told Omroep Brabant. “At the moment it crashed, we saw a ball of fire and that was it.”

The highway will remain blocked off for the rest of the day, emergency services added.

One of the worst aviation accidents in recent times happened in the Netherlands in 2009, when a Turkish Airlines passenger jet crashed on approach to Schiphol airport.

Nine people were killed and more than 80 injured in the crash, which investigators at the time said was caused by a faulty altimeter.

In 1992, 43 people were killed when an Israeli El Al Boeing 747 smashed into a block of flats in Amsterdam’s Bijlmermeer neighbourhood shortly after take-off from Schiphol.