Quiberon - Fifteen people including two babies were feared dead after a mid-air collision between two light aircraft yesterday over the Atlantic off the Brittany town of Quiberon, officials said. A total of 32 people were killed yesterday in five plane crashes in France, Russia, India, Pakistan, and in the Mediterranean.
The French aircraft - a Beechcraft 1900 belonging to the Proteus regional airline, carrying 12 passengers and two crew, and a Cessna of the Vannes air club, with only the pilot aboard - plunged into the sea 10 km off Britanny.
Three people were killed and 13 injured when a Russian military helicopter crashed on landing in eastern Siberia, the Interfax news agency reported. At least nine people were killed when an Indian Airlines Dornier plane crashed just after take-off in the southern city of Cochin. A Pakistan Air Force plane crashed into a residential area in the outskirts of Karachi, killing at least four people and injuring 11.
One aviator was killed when two F-14 fighter jets from the aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower collided over the eastern Mediterranean Sea, the US Navy said. After the collision, one of the planes crashed into the sea. The two crew members ejected, but one was killed.