A Eurofighter jet crashed in Sicily, five miles from its base, while approaching Trapani airport for landing. According to the first information published by the Italian media, the body of the pilot has been recovered.
A search had been underway for the aircraft that went down in the Marsala area of Sicily as it was approaching the military airport of Trapani Birgi, on Tuesday night.
But now teams of firefighters have recovered the lifeless body of the pilot who belonged to the Eurofighter 37th Wing, reported the agency ANSA.
The plane was in the Locogrande region which is a few miles north of Marsala where it crashed for unknown reasons.
Specialist firefighters using illuminated balloons were able to find the wreckage of the plane in a riverbed.
The alarm was sounded at around 6 pm – local time – and at 6.05 pm, when a notice to pilots (NOTAM) was issued for flight Dat from Pantelleria, which was due to land in Birgi after 7 pm, as written by the La Repubblica. A helicopter of the 82 SAR department immediately took off to coordinate the search from above, while firefighters, ambulances, and other emergency vehicles immediately rushed to the crash site.
The rescue operations that followed were extremely difficult, due to the fire that had enveloped the aircraft.
It is the military aircraft “Eurofighter Typhoon” – a single-seat multi-role interceptor – that crashed at the mouth of the Birgi river in Sicily.
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