An annular plane used for aerobatics crashed in the sea of south-eastern France during the flight show on Friday, and the pilot was not able to bail out. The incident occurred with a Fouga Magister aircraft flying over Le Lavandou before the official performance by the colorful French Air Force parachute display team, said the air force spokesman.
It was designed and built after the Second World War, and for quite a long time, the Fouga Magister was the training jet and aerobatics aircraft for the French army. What is rather striking is that the possibility of an ejection seat is eliminated in the design of the aircraft.
Emergency services managed to find the body of the 65-year-old pilot soon after the incident, officials and the prefecture said. Because of these “tragic circumstances,” the airshow was claimed to be canceled by the military authorities.
This comes in the backdrop of another misfortune in French aviation, where two pilots perished in a mid-air crash between two Rafale fighter jets a week earlier in the east of France. A third pilot in that crash over Colombey-les-Belles a town in northeastern France managed to eject from his aircraft.
