Air record attempt ends in crash

The pilot had 30 years' experience of flying
A record attempt by the pilot of a light plane has ended in disaster, with the aircraft crashing into a block of flats in the Swiss city of Basel.
The pilot was killed and six people in the flats were reported to have been slightly injured.

Accident investigators are looking into the cause of the crash.

The single-engined plane had just taken off on what was intended to be an 8,000 km (4,970-mile) flight to the United States.

The pilot was identified as Hans Georg Schmid, a former Swissair pilot, with more than 16,000 hours of flight experience over three decades.

He was trying to break a world record for a solo flight with a C1-D class plane by reaching the US city of Oshkosh, Wisconsin, in 30 hours.

The crash happened shortly after take off from the Basel-Mulhouse-Freiburg airport, across the border in France.

The plane was fuelled by 1,700 litres (450 gallons) of kerosene.


http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6912431.stm