LUCKNOW: A major accident was narrowly avoided on Thursday morning when a private aircraft, registered as VT-DEZ, skidded off the runway at Mohammadabad airstrip in Uttar Pradesh’s Farrukhabad and stopped just short of the boundary wall.
All six people on board, including four passengers and two pilots, had a narrow escape.
The incident happened around 11.15 am when the aircraft, operated by Jetserve Aviation began its take-off roll. However, after covering about 400 metres on the runway, the plane veered off course and lost alignment, finally stopping just short of the perimeter wall.
According to officials, the aircraft was a twin-engine charter plane with a 2+6 seating configuration and was scheduled to take off for Bhopal. Pilots Nasib Baman and Prateek Fernandes were at the controls at the time of the incident.
The passengers onboard included Ajay Arora, Deputy Managing Director of Woodpecker Green Agri Nutripad Pvt Ltd, who had arrived with a team to assess the upcoming beer manufacturing unit in the Khimsepur industrial area.
Sumit Sharma, from SBI, Rakesh Tikku, vice president (operations), and Manish Pandey, UP project head were also on board.
Police and administrative officials, including SDM Sadar Rajnikant Pandey, CO Ajay Verma, and Mohammadabad police, rushed to the site soon after the incident. A fire brigade was also dispatched as a precautionary measure.
Mohammadabad Kotwali SHO Vinod Shukla said preliminary findings suggest that low air pressure in one of the aircraft’s wheels may have caused it to veer off the runway. He confirmed that all passengers were safe and later left the site by car.
It was later confirmed that the group had arrived in Farrukhabad, on Wednesday, and was scheduled to return on Thursday morning when the incident occurred.
A video seen on social media showed the aircraft lying on the ground with its wings and propeller clearly visible.
The aircraft is considered to have sustained only minor damage, though its front section was visibly tilted towards the ground.