Indian Airforce loses Canberra Recon aircraft, two pilots in Agra

VIJAY UPADHYAY

AGRA. The Indian Air Force lost two pilots and a trainer aircraft when a Canberra PR9 Tactical Reconnaissance-cum-trainer aircraft crashed outside a village in Agra during a routine sortie.
Sources informed that the aircraft, which had taken off from the Agra Air Force base on a routine sortie at 1:50 this afternoon, was being flown by Sqn. Ldr. Berry with Flt. Lt. Sharma as his navigator when the aircraft developed a technical snag in its engine barely a few minutes into flight and burst into flames in mid-air while returning towards the Air Force base.
Knowing the plane was going to crash in the village, Sqn. Ldr. Berry turned the aircraft into the fields of Jataura village near the Malpura dropping zone about 14 km. outside Agra, where the plane crashed, killing both pilots instantly, though earlier reports were that the pilots had been able to eject safely out of the aircraft. Badly charred and dismembered bodies of both pilots were recovered three hours later from the wreckage of the aircraft when the Air Force recovery squad reached the spot.
According to the available information, the vintage Canberra aircraft, which had been inducted in the Indian Airforce in 1957 and has been in the service of the country since the past four decades serving as a bomber and photo-reconnaissance aircraft, had not crashed in its career except 9 aircrafts lost during the two Indo-Pak wars of ’65 and ‘71.
The aircraft had served successfully as a reconnaissance aircraft during the Kargil conflict, providing valuable photographic information of enemy locations on the hill-tops, even surviving a missile strike, a feat that no Indian aircraft has been able to accomplish till date.
The Agra administration reached the spot immediately after the crash, providing a security cordon to the wreckage which was spread for almost 4 km. around the village, till the air-force took the wreckage into its custody.

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