Small plane hit a vehicle as it crashed in Langley

Three people were sent to hospital after a plane went down in Langley Township Tuesday afternoon.

According to the Langley Township Fire Department, the small plane clipped a vehicle as it crashed, injuring the driver who was travelling along 216 Street near 56 Avenue. 

Langley RCMP say the pilot and a passenger were transported to hospital by air ambulance. The driver in the vehicle was sent to hospital by ground ambulance.

The Township of Langley said the small plane impacted a vehicle travelling South on 216 Street while attempting to land at the Langley Regional Airport. 

“The impact resulted in the plane crashing on the airport grounds at the east end of one of two runways,” an email statement reads.

Deputy Fire Chief Russ Jenkins tells Daily Hive the plane caught fire, and when fire crews arrived on the scene, the plane was fully involved. 

The fire is now out, and Transportation Safety Board personnel is on site investigating. 

The Township of Langley said the plane is fully destroyed. 

“That could have been us”

Lindsay Paul and her husband has just picked up their daughter from Langley Secondary School when she noticed a plane flying unusually low.

“We were coming out of the school to turn left at the 216th [Street and 56th Avenue] intersection and we were waiting for the lane change and I said to my husband … ‘Oh, that one’s coming in hot and low.’

“And he’s like, ‘Yeah, way too low.'”

That’s when Paul saw the plane hit the roof of a truck, and “then I guess the pilot tried to get his wings back to go over the fence to land at the airport … and then the wheel that was still intact of the plane had clipped the fence and he spun out.”

She said the plane spun three to four times before nose-diving into a grass field and within seconds, “the whole cockpit was on fire.”

If it wasn’t for her husband deciding to turn left at the intersection instead of going straight, Paul says “that plane could have hit us too — easily.”

“That thought just keeps playing over like, oh my god, that could have been us being hit by that plane too.”

Traffic in the area remains impacted at this time.