A Trans Guyana Airways skyvan en route to the country’s interior with seven persons on board crashed in a canefield one minute after take off resulting in the death of one.

The British-manufactured plane was on its way to Ekereku Bottom, a mining area, in the Upper Mazaruni, and according to the head of the Civil Aviation Department, Chabeenanan Ramphal, the plane left the Ogle Aerodrome at 10:59 hrs and encountered difficulties one minute into flight time.

The commander of the flight Sarve Paul, he said, alerted the Control Tower that he was experiencing difficulties and was going to make an emergency landing in the surrounding canefield.

Immediately, Ramphal said, the emergency services including the Guyana Fire Service and the Guyana Police Force were alerted, but residents from the North Ruimveldt and Sophia, `E’ Field area who saw from the ground that the plane was in difficulty ran to the scene and pulled the flight crew and passengers out.

Ramphal said that the cockpit voice recorder (CVR) had been found and should be sent to Trinidad and Tobago on Monday to be read. He expects that once read, the CVR may be able to shed some light on the accident. He expects the reading to be available by Tuesday or Wednesday.

Asked what might have caused the accident, Ramphal told the media that the three CAD inspectors and other relevant authorities were investigating and he could make no pronouncement, neither did he want to speculate as to what had occurred.

However, he averaged that the plane had flown to a height of about 400 feet when it started to encounter difficulties. The aircraft took off from runway 24 which was north- east of the Ogle Aerodrome and was heading south. He felt that if the aircraft had been at a higher altitude the pilot could have better managed the situation. “It was really too close after take off so there was not enough altitude to take control...,” he said.

He said that the CAD will put in place an investigation team which will look at the record of the servicing of the aircraft, maintenance history, the pilots’ training and their licensing, and analyze the aviation fuel. However, he said, age has no direct bearing on the safety of the aircraft.

Contacted about the crash, Nicole Correia of Trans Guyana Airways confirmed what Stabroek News had been told and had seen on the ground. She said their technical people were investigating.

Managing Director of Roraima Airways, Gerry Gouveia, who was on the scene, told Stabroek News that the pilots were experienced and trained according to international standards.

The aircraft, a short skyvan, made in Belfast, Northern Ireland had two engines. It normally operated with two flight crew, a pilot and co-pilot, but yesterday a third crew member was on board to deal with the cargo, Ramphal said.

The rescue

Two residents of Sophia `E’ Field, who were involved in the rescue operation told Stabroek News that they are used to the planes flying overhead as their homes lie in the landing and take-off path of aircraft. But they said that yesterday, when they saw the plane tilting with the propeller of the left engine not spinning they realized that the skyvan was in difficulty. They said they stopped what they were doing and followed the descent.

In the plane there were two generators and an engine described as a dredge engine.

Nadia Henry told Stabroek News that she and other residents ran along the dam which was all mud and slush, falling and getting up as they followed the path of the aircraft. She, like some others, saw it head over the Upper North Ruimveldt area and turn into the canefield.

Her report coincided with that of the CAD and others who said that the plane hit the gully separating Upper North Ruim-veldt and the canefield and skidded to a halt about 100 feet away.

Another resident Darell Isaacs said that he was cooking at the time and ran all the way through to the site. Some residents, he said, jumped on a tractor which plodded through the mud to the site. When he got there, he said, the pilot and co-pilot were already free, but there were people trapped in the cabin. He went into the cabin and worked with others to get the five men out. The two most difficult to release were trapped under a generator and the dredge engine. After a tough fight in which persons fought to lift the dredge engine, he said, the man, who turned out to be the third crew member, was rescued.

Henry recalled that this man was handed to her group who were receiving the men from the aircraft and placing them on the ground. She said that he was alive and conscious as she received him. She said that when he was placed on the ground she was talking to him as advised by a “big woman” to keep him alive. At the time, she said, she had his head in her hands keeping it raised. How-ever, she said, policemen appeared on the scene and started to push people aside.

She said a policeman pushed her causing her to let go of the man’s head. After that he was placed in a boat in the nearby trench to be taken to the hospital. She said that even before the police arrived there were many residents on the scene; pregnant women, women with babies in arms and children. Because they did not know whether there was danger of an explosion, the persons who were rescuing the injured urged them to keep their distance.

Another man, who preferred anonymity, said that when they arrived on the scene, the engine which was working when the plane crashed, was smoking. He said that the place reeked of fuel which he thought was gasolene but was later told it was kerosene. He said they realized that they needed to get the people out of the area as quickly as possible before there was any ignition, so they tried to pull the engine away, but the rope burst. A tractor was then used to pull the fuel tank away from the body of the aircraft to avoid an explosion. There was no explosion.

He said that the pilot while being pulled to safety kept mumbling that he tried to veer away from hitting the houses, and so turned in the direction of the canefield where he crashed.

Some North Ruimveldt residents said that they thought the plane was going to crash on their homes.

The last fatal plane crash was a Cessna 206 which went down on its way to Mahdia in Region Eight (Potaro/Siparuni) killing veteran pilot Derek Leung and his employee Wasim Sattaur.

CAD official, Zulfikar Mohamed noted that the last similar accident involved Captain Bush Fraites about two years ago. He was still in an altitude climb when he encountered difficulties and crash landed.