World War II vintage plane crash leaves 22 dead

The wreckage of the Junkers JU52 aircraft in Flims. Pic/AFP

Up to 20 people are feared dead after a vintage World War II aircraft crashed into a Swiss mountainside, local reports said yesterday. The Junker JU52 HB-HOT aircraft, built in Germany in 1939 and now a collectors' item, belongs to JU-Air, a company with links to the Swiss air force, the ATS news agency reported. The Junker plane, which can carry up to 17 passengers and three crew, crashed into the Piz Segnas mountain Saturday, at an altitude of around 2,500 metres.

The plane was full for the flight, suggesting that up to 20 people may be dead. The flight had been due to land at the Duebendorf military airfield near Zurich on Saturday afternoon. A witness who was on the mountainside at the time of the crash said, "The plane turned 180 degrees to the south and fell to the ground like a stone." JU-Air said that its flight operations were suspended.

Family of 4 dies in the woods
A small plane crashed yesterday into a forest in central Switzerland, killing a local family of four who had just taken off for France, police said. Authorities had to send up a helicopter to extinguish the resulting fire before rescue workers could get to the scene, they said. There was no immediate word on the possible cause of the crash, which was under investigation by Swiss authorities. Police said later that the victims were a couple and their two children from the region aboard the plane.

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