Military aircraft crashes above Vercellese, leaving two dead

  VERCELLESE - An experimental military aircraft has exploded during flight above the countryside of Vercellese and crashed between Santhià and Alice Castello. According to the Emergency response team, 118, who were on the scene with the fire department, two burnt bodies of test pilots were found. 

  This was a "tiltrotor" medium-light AW 609 Agusta Westland plane. This particular type of aircraft is able to take off vertically and, after the rotation of the wings and propellers by ninety degrees, can then fly as an airplane. The aircraft had departed from Vergirate, in the province of Varese, where the headquarters of the Agusta Westland are based.

  Some witnesses have reported hearing a roar, followed by falling debris, whereas some student eyewitnesses have said "it was flying low over the houses and it was on fire. The pilot did well to take it up into the corn fields. If it had crashed in the city itself, it would have been a massacre".

  "I saw a fireball in the sky, then a loud explosion and the plane then began falling," said another witness. The crash took place in Ponte di Ferro, a hamlet in the countryside between Santhià, and Alice Castello. "We often see similar aircraft around here,” said an additional witness.