The wreckage of an ultralight aircraft known as a mikrofly in Norwegian was found in Meløy, Nordland County during the night after it crashed on Tuesday with two people on board. Both were killed, and Norway’s air sports federation was suspending all mikrofly licenses until pilots go through a safety seminar.
“We’ve had some incidents with mikrofly recently and we want to take a break,” Rolf Liland, president of Norges Luftsportforbund, told state broadcaster NRK. He stressed there isn’t necessarily anything wrong with the aircraft, but pilot licenses will be suspended until local flying clubs have carried out safety seminars for all members.
“All clubs will host these seminars as soon as possible, hopefully in the course of the week,” Liland said.
The aircraft that crashed was equipped for landing on water. It took off from the lake Markvatnet near Reipå Tuesday morning, carrying two men who were searching for reindeer herds. “It was a small plane to fly low in connection with reindeer herding,” Frode Iversen, who led the search and rescue operation, told NRK. He confirmed finding the wreckage in the mountains east of Glomfjord and the bodies of the two men on board.
Both men lived in Nordland and were in their 30s and 50s. The aircraft was last seen around 2pm Tuesday afternoon and reported missing around 10pm. The search and rescue effort involved two F16 fighter jets, a Sea King helicopter, air ambulance and two military Bell helicopters.
newsinenglish.no staff
