Cromer: Pilot, passenger injured in light plane crash on soccer field
A light aircraft was forced to make an emergency landing on a suburban soccer pitch in Sydney’s north, with cricketers on the field forced to run to safety.
NSW
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A suburban cricketer has potentially saved his mates’ lives after light aircraft crashed onto a local cricket field in Sydney’s north on this afternoon.
Northern Beaches man Greg Rollins said his mates were seconds from disaster when the plane was forced into an emergency landing in Cromer, 20km north of the CBD about 4.30pm.
Mr Rollins was in the middle of a cricket game when they spotted the plane plummeting to the sports grounds’ lower field.
Right in the path of destruction were about half a dozen of his mates under a shed.
“They could not see it coming,” Mr Rollins said.
“We just saw the plane going over and said ‘what’s that, it’s getting lower’, it circled around and was in distress so I just yelled out to them ‘run, just run’.
“I have never seen anything like it.”
Mr Rollins then raced into action with an opposition player and helped drag the pilot and his passenger out.
“We had to drag him away from the plane,” he recalled of the frantic scene.
“He was in shock, he was really in shock, his face was a mess.
“He was okay but I kept talking to him, telling him ‘you’ll be all right mate’,
“(The passenger’s) femur was broken, there was bone sticking out of his skin.”
The plane smashed into the side of the pitch, narrowly missing the shed, after losing engine power and gliding into an emergency landing.
The passenger, 34, was taken to Westmead Hospital with a broken leg while the pilot was taken to Northern Beaches Hospital for treatment.
Both are likely to escape their brush with death with non-life-threatening injuries.
“A light plane has come down in the middle of our cricket game,” Cromer Cricket Club president Stewart Edwards said.
“The team are they were there and had to run but everyone is safe.”
Fire crews and police are also on scene.
The cause of the crash will be investigated.
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