Panic as plane crashes into Florida shopping centre and bursts into flames

Updated
Panic as plane crashes into Florida shopping centre and bursts into flames
Panic as plane crashes into Florida shopping centre and bursts into flames

AP


Shoppers were left terrified last night after a light aircraft crashed into a shopping centre in Florida.

At least five people were injured, two with burns, and the pilot and a passenger were airlifted to the Orlando Regional Medical Centre.

According to the Daily Mail, a number of people at the Northgate Shopping Centre in Deland, Florida, called emergency services at around 7.20pm on Monday to report a plane spiralled out of the sky and into the shopping centre.

A photographer from the Daytona Beach News-Journal reported that the plane appeared to have plummeted into the roof of a Publix supermarket.

Roth Peeler, who lives about 300ft behind the store, told the Orlando Sentinel he saw the plane go down.

"A small single-engine, yellow plane spiralled right down and through the roof and just exploded," Mr Peeler said. "Not a piece of the plane came out. It's all in the store.

"I went around the front and saw people running out of the store and trying to get into their cars and out of the parking lot."

Deland is about 20 miles west of Daytona Beach and the shopping centre is not far from the Deland Municipal Airport, according to the Telegraph.

Photographs of the incident show a dark column of smoke pluming from the rooftop. Around 20 fire engines were at the scene, where firefighters climbed extension ladders in a bid to hose down the flames.

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