A helicopter crashed into a crane on top of one of Europe’s tallest residential blocks in central London yesterday, killing two people as it burst into flames and threw plumes of smoke into the air.
Police said there was nothing to indicate that the crash on the south bank of the River Thames was linked to an attack on London, where 52 commuters were killed in rush hour suicide bombings in 2005.
“There was a really loud bang,” said Julie Marsden, who works in an office building near the crash site which is close to landmarks such as the headquarters of Britain’s MI6 international intelligence agency and the Houses of Parliament.
PHOTO: AFP
“We saw the crane fall to the ground and this massive plume of black smoke,” Marsden told reporters.
London police Commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe said there were 11 casualties, including two dead and one critically injured. The fire service said it had rescued a man from a burning car near Vauxhall Train Station, a major commuter station on the south side of London, shortly after 8am.
Hogan-Howe said the helicopter had been diverted to a helipad in Battersea, near the crash site. He declined to give further information until relatives had been informed.
Rezart Islami, 27, a construction worker from Kosovo who had been on a nearby site, said he saw the helicopter flying fast up the river before it smashed into the crane, span out of control and hit the ground bursting into flames some seconds later.
The crane fell and hit two cars.
“I was shocked, it was spinning around and lost control,” he told reporters.
Another witness, Edmir Pishtar, who was in a van outside the building site, said he saw half the crane crash down and cut into two cars on the road. He later spoke to the crane operator who was about to get inside the crane cab.
“He was literally shaking because he was getting ready to climb into the crane and he was late,” Pishtar said.
The circular block — The Tower, One St George Wharf — is described on its Web site as the epitome of luxury London living.
Builder Brookfield Multiplex said the tower, which is not occupied, is 185m high and has 212 luxury apartments. Media reports in recent years have suggested that the penthouse apartments could go for as much as ￡50 million (US$80 million).
A media correspondent at the scene said tangled bits of crane could be seen hanging off the side of the tower, the top of which was still shrouded by low cloud. Television footage showed flaming wreckage strewn across a road.
“Fortunately for us, we have done a full headcount and there are no injuries or fatalities among anyone on the site,” said Tony Pidgley, chairman of the tower’s developer, Berkeley Group . “The crane driver normally starts at eight o’clock, but unusually — today of all days — [he] was late.”
He said it was too early to speculate on the cause of the crash, but helicopters should normally fly 150m above tall structures.
Police were questioning witnesses in the area and dozens of emergency vehicles were in attendance, reporters said. London train and underground services were working as usual.
“There’s nothing to suggest any terrorism link,” a spokesman for London’s Counter Terrorism Command said.
Helicopters in London are generally supposed to fly along the River Thames, but London City Airport said its flights had been disrupted due to low visibility.
The British Department of Transport said it was preparing to launch an inquiry into the incident.
AGING: As of last month, people aged 65 or older accounted for 20.06 percent of the total population and the number of couples who got married fell by 18,685 from 2024 Taiwan has surpassed South Korea as the country least willing to have children, with an annual crude birthrate of 4.62 per 1,000 people, Ministry of the Interior data showed yesterday. The nation was previously ranked the second-lowest country in terms of total fertility rate, or the average number of children a woman has in her lifetime. However, South Korea’s fertility rate began to recover from 2023, with total fertility rate rising from 0.72 and estimated to reach 0.82 to 0.85 by last year, and the crude birthrate projected at 6.7 per 1,000 people. Japan’s crude birthrate was projected to fall below six,
US President Donald Trump in an interview with the New York Times published on Thursday said that “it’s up to” Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) what China does on Taiwan, but that he would be “very unhappy” with a change in the “status quo.” “He [Xi] considers it to be a part of China, and that’s up to him what he’s going to be doing, but I’ve expressed to him that I would be very unhappy if he did that, and I don’t think he’ll do that. I hope he doesn’t do that,” Trump said. Trump made the comments in the context
SELF-DEFENSE: Tokyo has accelerated its spending goal and its defense minister said the nation needs to discuss whether it should develop nuclear-powered submarines China is ramping up objections to what it sees as Japan’s desire to acquire nuclear weapons, despite Tokyo’s longstanding renunciation of such arms, deepening another fissure in the two neighbors’ increasingly tense ties. In what appears to be a concerted effort, China’s foreign and defense ministries issued statements on Thursday condemning alleged remilitarism efforts by Tokyo. The remarks came as two of the country’s top think tanks jointly issued a 29-page report framing actions by “right-wing forces” in Japan as posing a “serious threat” to world peace. While that report did not define “right-wing forces,” the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs was
PREPAREDNESS: Given the difficulty of importing ammunition during wartime, the Ministry of National Defense said it would prioritize ‘coproduction’ partnerships A newly formed unit of the Marine Corps tasked with land-based security operations has recently replaced its aging, domestically produced rifles with more advanced, US-made M4A1 rifles, a source said yesterday. The unnamed source familiar with the matter said the First Security Battalion of the Marine Corps’ Air Defense and Base Guard Group has replaced its older T65K2 rifles, which have been in service since the late 1980s, with the newly received M4A1s. The source did not say exactly when the upgrade took place or how many M4A1s were issued to the battalion. The confirmation came after Chinese-language media reported
RSS