Indian students walk away from NZ crash

Two aviation students yesterday walked away after their plane flipped and landed upside down on an area of runway ploughed for resowing at Omaka Aerodrome near Blenheim.
The Indian students on board the Cessna 150 were shaken but uninjured in the crash which happened just after 3pm.
Marlborough Aero Club secretary Ginetta Pali said the plane nosedived into the ground and flipped over.
“We rushed out and fortunately they were OK,” she said. That area of the grass runway had been disc-ploughed for resowing and was marked, she said. “They were supposed to land next to it.”
Associated Aviation business manager John Read said the woman student pilot, who had her private pilot’s licence, was on a cross-country training flight from Paraparaumu to Omaka.
The pilot and her passenger, who was also a student at the flying school, were from India. There were more than 200 Indian students learning to fly in New Zealand, he said. The plane had not nose-dived and it was a minor incident. The flying school had not had any other incidents since it had been purchased in May 2005, said Read.
19/03/08 Marlborough Express, New Zealand