Plane Wing Cuts Woman In Half

Posted: Feb 15 2012

JOHANNESBURG – A horrific accident killed a woman at a landing strip at the Ermelo airport in South Africa.

The woman was cut in half when she tried crossing the landing strip at the exact time a small plane was landing.

Airport police say the woman, in a late fifties, went looking for branches with two friends and crossed the landing strip while the plane landed. One wing of the plane sliced the woman in two.

“Most likely the women wanted to cross the landing strip to shorten their path but one of them misjudged the situation and got hit by the left wing of a descending plane,” a spokesperson said.

According to South African airline forums, pilots often complain about people and animals cross the landing strips at Ermelo on a regular basis thereby putting not just themselves in great danger but the pilots and passengers on board the planes as well.

Pilots blame the dangerous crossings on the lack of security fences surrounding the roads thus giving people access freely.

One of the pilots wrote how he managed to barely avoid a disaster involving a group of five individuals who sat comfortably on the tarmac drinking and having fun at the Vanderbijlpark airport in South Africa.

South Africa’s airline authority agency CAA is investigating the accident at the Ermelo airport.