Nine killed as skydiving plane crashes in Sweden

A small plane carrying skydivers crashed outside the Swedish city of Orebro on Thursday night, killing all nine people on board, police said.

The dead included the pilot and eight passengers, police said.

The victims were members of a local skydiving club, according to Orebro County Governor Maria Larsson.

Spokesperson Carl-Johan Linde of the Swedish Maritime Administration, which oversees air traffic, told broadcaster SVT the crash must have occurred “in connection” with the plane’s takeoff.

The plane burst into flames upon impact on what appeared to be an open field.

“There were no lives to save,” local fire chief Per-Ove Staberyd, who coordinated the work of firefighters and other first responders, said.

Police received word of the crash shortly before 7:30pm local time (17:30 GMT) and quickly knew it was “a very serious incident”, deputy regional police chief Niclas Hallgren said on Friday.

He said investigating the accident would be “a difficult job”. “It will take its time,” Hallgren added.

The officer declined to provide details about the victims or speculate the circumstances leading to the crash. The Swedish Accident Investigation Authority immediately dispatched a team to the crash site outside Orebro, which is located 164km (102 miles) west of Stockholm.

The Dagens Nyheter newspaper identified the plane as a single-engine, propeller-driven De Havilland DHC-2 Beaver.

Prime Minister Stefan Lofven wrote on Twitter that it was “with great sadness and dismay” that he heard about the crash, and he expressed his “deepest sympathy”.

Flags flew at half-mast in Orebro, and the prime minister said during an impromptu news conference that Friday was “a day of mourning in Sweden”.