Antoine Llorca-
This pilot has seen death… twice. In Los Angeles, a passenger plane pilot crash-landed on a level crossing on Sunday, before being pulled out of the cockpit by police, just seconds before the plane was pulverized by a train.
Los Angeles police, who posted video of the rescue recorded by one of the officers’ on-board camera on Twitter, said the single-engine aircraft suffered a loss of propulsion as it took off from a nearby airfield. The septuagenarian pilot who was at the controls therefore had to make an emergency landing, landing in the middle of town and half-immobilizing on railway tracks.
In the police video, officers can be seen rushing to pull the pilot out of the cockpit, his face bloody and visibly stunned. The police barely have time to drag him away when, five seconds later, a train running at full speed hits the plane head-on, causing the surrounding debris to fly.
“I think this guy needs to buy a lotto ticket because he still cheated death twice in ten minutes”Robert Sherock, one of the two police officers who brought the pilot to safety, told NBC television.
The pilot was taken to hospital and his condition was stable on Sunday evening. He was alone on the plane and the accident caused no other injuries, said the emergency services.