Billionaire’s chopper goes in hard, burns
Britain
A helicopter belonging to Leicester City’s owner crashed in flames in a carpark next to the soccer club’s stadium shortly after it took off from the field following a Premier League game on Saturday.
The team said it was assisting authorities with ‘‘a major incident’’ at the stadium but there were no details about who was on board or their condition.
The Air Accident Investigation Branch is working alongside the emergency services and the club to ‘‘establish the exact circumstances of the collision,’’ Leicestershire Police said in a statement.
Billionaire Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha, who owns Thai duty-free retail giant King Power, bought Leicester in 2010 and provided the funds that helped the team improbably win the Premier League at odds of 5000-1 in 2016.
Leicester has not said if its owner was on the helicopter. In a scene regularly seen after matches, Vichai’s aircraft arrived in the King Power Stadium after Saturday’s 1-1 draw against West Ham before taking off from the centre circle more than an hour after full time.
Photographer Ryan Brown reported hearing the engine stopping after the helicopter cleared the stadium.
‘‘I turned round and it made a bit of a whirring noise, like a grinding noise,’’ Brown told the BBC. ‘‘The helicopter just went silent, I turned round and it was just spinning, out of control. And then there was a big bang and then (a) big fireball.’’ –AP