Miracle more weren’t killed
Hero pilot steered stricken helicopter away from football spectators
THE heroic actions of the pilot and policemen involved in the Leicester City helicopter horror were recounted last night.
Eyewitnesses said the pilot prevented greater loss of life by steering the doomed craft away from crowds of soccer fans.
And two policeman were hailed for their bravery in trying to rescue the passengers and crew before the helicopter exploded.
All five on board died in Saturday evening’s crash. They included Leicester owner Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha. The others are believed to be two members of staff, Nursara Suknamai and Kaveporn Punpare, pilot Eric Swaffer and his partner, passenger Izabela Roza Lechowicz.
Howth-born Susan Whelan, the chief executive officer of Leicester owners King Power, is understood to be safe after the tragedy.
The helicopter spiralled out of control moments after it took off from the pitch following a Premier League match at Leicester’s King Power Stadium.
Instead of crashing into the stands and hospitality areas it came down on empty land 200 yards from the stadium before erupting in a fireball.
It avoided busy roads and the last of the 31,000 fans who were still in the area along with dozens of police officers.
Experts suspect the tail rotor failed, sending the €7million AgustaWestland AW169 into a ‘dead man’s curve’ that even the best pilot would not have been able to handle.
Mr Srivaddhanaprabha’s helicopter has in the past been flown by Eric Swaffer, 53, who has posted pictures of the craft on social media. His partner is thought to be flight instructor Izabela Lechowicz, 46. Both are from Surrey.
Last night, neighbours said they feared for the ‘lovely couple’, with one saying he had been trying to contact Mr Swaffer. ‘I know Eric was there yesterday. I didn’t know about Izabela though – she tended to do the longer-haul flights.’
The two heroic police officers were spotted running toward the burning wreckage and attempting to smash through the helicopter’s glass windows to pull out survivors, before being forced back by an explosion.
Dan Cox, a Sky Sports News cameraman, described the pilot and police as heroes.
‘I don’t know how the pilot did it but he seemed to manage to slow down the spinning rotation and it drifted off into the corner part of the car park,’ he said.
‘To my mind the pilot was heroic and the two police officers in front of me, who also tried to help, they are heroes too. It could have been so much worse if the pilot hadn’t done that.’
Leicester City season ticket holder Amanda Smith said: ‘The pilot is a hero. How many people were saved by the helicopter landing where it did? Especially when the pilot knew how unlikely it was they would survive.’
The 48-year-old health and safety specialist added: ‘If there was a perfect place to land, that was it – it minimised the risk to life given the busy roads and buildings all around.’
Joe Birch, 24, a sales assistant, also praised the pilot, saying: ‘If the helicopter had landed anywhere else, there could have been more deaths and serious injuries. The pilot is definitely a hero.’
Witnesses reported a ‘whirring and grinding noise’ and seeing the aircraft spin out of control seconds after lifting off from the pitch at about 8.30pm following Leicester’s match with West Ham.
Britain’s Air Accidents Investigation Branch has been called in.
Mr Swaffer, who was born in London, has posted a number of pictures from King Power Stadium on his social media accounts, including one of him with the Dalai Lama. He has flown for Britain’s royal family and for live media broadcasts.
Leo Bruka, 27, a Leicester resident, saw the two officers try to help crash survivors.
‘One policeman ran straight away to the helicopter and he was trying to break the window of the helicopter,’ he said. ‘The other one was inside the car looking for something and then the next minute he had a fire extinguisher trying to prevent the fire.
‘This was all going on for five to ten seconds and then there was an explosion and the policeman and all the three or four other guys that were trying to help but they just pulled back because the fire was getting too hot.’
The tragedy is being described as the ‘darkest day’ in Leicester City’s history.
Mourners laid wreaths near the stadium yesterday morning.
Leicester goalkeeper Kasper Schmeichel was reportedly in tears after witnessing the crash and was among those who raced to the scene in a bid to help.
Thousands of supporters flocked to the ground yesterday, laying hundreds of flowers, shirts, and scarves, in tribute to Mr Srivaddhanaprabha, 60, and the others on board. The duty-free billionaire, who has been hailed for his charitable donations, bought the club for £39million in 2010. The club rose out of the Championship and won the Premier League for the first time in its history in 2015-16, defying odds of 5,000/1.
‘Forced back by an explosion’ Schmeichel was in tears at the scene
THE contrast was as chilling as the icy October air. Here outside the King Power Stadium two-and-a-half years ago, the main concourse was a sea of champagne and beer bottles. Now it was covered in flowers, wreaths and other tributes to the man who turned Leicester’s wildest dreams into reality.
‘It could not feel more different,’ said Andrew Hulley, the club chaplain who was here yesterday to offer his support to the thousands of fans who came to pay their respects.
‘When we won the title it was a night of unrestrained revelry; a sense of jubilation across the whole city.
‘But walking to the stadium this morning I felt this tingle down my spine. All these people are here. All this traffic. And yet there is this hushed atmosphere, this silence. People can’t believe it.’
Fairytales are not supposed to end like this. Not with the sound of Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha’s helicopter plummeting to the ground and bursting into flames, claiming the lives of the five poor souls on board.
Graham Chadwick, the longserving Sportsmail photographer who began his career taking pictures for this football club, was walking to his car when he realised there was a problem.
‘We’ve become used to seeing the chairman’s helicopter rising above the stadium, turning and heading south towards London,’ he said.
‘There are actually normally two of them. One comes in after the other to take people away.
‘They climb into the sky, turn 180 degrees and fly off over the back of the stadium.
‘But this time it kept spinning, and the sound of the engine wasn’t right. There was clearly something seriously wrong. I just saw the nose drop and the tail rise up before it fell towards the ground and out of sight. Then I heard the crash, and a few seconds later I saw the fireball, this inferno.’
Graham took out his camera and ran back towards the stadium. He was struck by the acrid smell of aviation fuel, the thick smog, the heat. By yesterday, all that remained, as Graham’s pictures revealed, was the mangled wreckage of an aircraft now shorn of its Leicester blue bodywork, with the cabin in which those on board perished covered by a green tarpaulin.
Only a few hundred yards away supporters continued to gather at the front of the north stand, a crowd that perfectly reflected the cultural diversity of the city and this club’s support.
All day and into the night they came and went, some with their families, some with their mates, some just on their own. Two burly guys climbed out of a cab armed only with a bunch of flowers that they added to a floral shrine expanding at such a rate stewards had to keep moving the steel railings. Many fans stood in quiet reflection. Some cried.
‘I think the scene here today is a reciprocation of the owner as a family man,’ said Hulley.
‘The fans feel they are part of a family here and that is the word I keep hearing people use today.’
Inside the hotel that is opposite the stadium, another group had assembled. They were the boys who belong to the Thai International Academy that was formed by Vichai back in 2015.
Often from poor backgrounds, these lads are given an education at a boarding school in Leicestershire as well as the opportunity to train alongside Jamie Vardy, Kasper Schmeichel and their colleagues at the club training ground.
Yesterday, we saw them being addressed by the head of the scheme, a Thai who is known to the boys simply as ‘Master’.
‘I was telling them about the chairman; about his story,’ he explained afterwards.
‘Some of these boys are playing for the junior national teams in Thailand. It was the chairman’s dream to one day see these boys develop and help Thailand to play in a World Cup.’
The boys eventually joined the supporters in paying their respects, no doubt with a sense of sorrow as well as uncertainty.
Quite what this means for Leicester City Football Club remains to be seen. But Vichai wanted to build on the legacy of that remarkable Premier League title triumph, committing close to £100million on a new training ground and the same again on increasing the capacity of the King Power Stadium to 40,000.
The owner’s son, known simply as Top, would seem the natural successor, having already been appointed chief executive officer of the parent company two years ago.
But staff have no idea if this Thai family will even want to maintain such close links to a football club that has suddenly become the scene of this terrible tragedy.
Yesterday was indescribably difficult for all of them. The head of communications always operates with a calm professionalism but he wore a haunted look as he tried to provide updates without even being able to confirm, for most of the day, if his boss was actually dead.
For now, all Leicester can do is take things one day at a time. Club chaplain Hulley, who offers support to those from all faiths as well as non-believers, spent time with the players on Saturday night and he said he will visit them at the training ground today.
With tomorrow’s Carabao Cup fixture against Southampton likely to be postponed, their next home game will probably be against Burnley on November 10, a game that now takes place in the absence of the man who made Leicester fans’ dreams come true