Shoreham air crash: ‘Afterwards there was a stunned silence’

An air crash on Saturday during the Shoreham Airshow in West Sussex was witnessed by thousands of people who had flocked to the first day of the air show, as well as horrified onlookers nearby.

Shoreham resident Dave Penwarden (51), said he saw the Hawker Hunter fighter jet, dating from the Cold War, explode in a "massive fireball".

“The plane was coming out of a loop-the-loop, it was fairly low,” he said. “It just didn’t seem to have enough speed to come out of the loop, instead of powering out it dropped too fast, and hit the ground.

“There was a massive fireball and an awful lot of smoke. Afterwards there was a stunned silence.

“Everyone just went quiet, it’s remarkable really. There was no more flying stunts and it’s all just been quiet.

“People are waiting for when they can leave, if you drove then you can’t leave and it’s going to be hours.”

Another witness David Hough (76), said he saw the aircraft flying low to the ground.

“Suddenly there was a big flash and flames and lots of smoke. Everyone was very quiet and subdued afterwards.

“A lot of people now can’t go home, if you came by car you’re stuck.”

Witness Gairo Gomez, who works at nearby Ricardo Technological Centre, said the whole building shook.

“I saw the plane going down,” he added. “I heard a huge bang and the glass was shaking and the doors were banging, the whole building was shaking.

“I saw some smoke later on, at the time I didn’t realise what had happened.

“Then I was told the plane had crashed, it’s terrible.”

Chris Watkins told BBC News: “The Hunter came across the airfield, did a turn behind us and as it swooped down to do its run across the airfield it just ploughed straight in to the road and the trees.”

Ailish Southall told BBC News: “We were waiting for it to go back up and it didn’t. It seemed to kind of split in two.

“There was a huge amount of fire. We ran from the car to avoid the debris because we were about 15 metres away. We were just across the road from where the accident happened.”

Photographs of the crash site taken by witnesses appeared to show the burning aircraft ploughing across the road just yards from cars and a group of people, its canopy open and wing ablaze, engulfing traffic lights and roadwork cones and signs in a huge ball of fire.

Burning debris is also visible high in the air.

Press Association