TIA plane takes wrong turn during take-off

Hours after conducting a drill at the E.T Joshua Airport on Wednesday firemen had on their hands a real situation to deal with – a plane had crashed.
It was just after 1 p.m when a Trans Island Air twin otter aircraft ran off the airstrip and crashed into the fence in the vicinity of the nearby Sunrise (C.K. Greaves) Supermarket car park.{{more}}
It eventually came to rest in a large drain just inside the protected airport compound.
The aircraft had been earlier chartered by LIAT to transport luggage to St. Vincent and the Grenadines to relieve the Carnival travel backlog and had already delivered its cargo. When the mishap occurred, it was taxiing down the runway preparing to fly to Canouan to resume its normal flight schedule.
Peter Perreira, a Barbadian pilot with 20 years’ experience piloted the craft. Also onboard was the first officer and an engineer.
Recalling the frightful drama, taxi driver Andrew John told SEARCHLIGHT he was sitting in his van, in the Sunrise Supermarket parking lot awaiting some passengers who were shopping when he witnessed the aircraft ran off the airstrip.
“I was listening to some music, I heard the sound of the plane coming down. I just happen’ to look up then I saw it started to swerve from across there (pointing towards the area where the plane lay). I kept my eyes upon it, because I said I don’t know what going and happen.
“When I saw the plane heading for here I jumped out of my van because if one of those propellers had come off, I know it could have reached me. I even hit my head on the door and I run lef’ my van,” said John.
“Not even the fastest runner in St. Vincent and the Grenadines could have catch me at that time,” said the taxi man expressing how swiftly he ran to safety.
“It’s the first time in my life I ever experience such fear. I was very much scared, very, very much scared,” John emphasized.
“I even saw when the pilot trying to get out of the plane. Only one pilot I see to be honest, but the frighten feelings in me, I run, so I did not know if there were other pilots in there.”
A minibus operator said he was heading out of Arnos Vale area when he heard an explosion on the airstrip.
He said, “I pull off the road the same time and I happen to see when the plane coming up there by the fence.”
The mishap caused a major traffic back-up for over two hours as police attempted to cordon off the area near where the plane lay with one wing protruding onto the hard shoulder of the main artery to and from capital Kingstown.
Firefighters sprayed the crippled craft which was leaking fuel from one engine with foam as a precautionary measure as hundreds of curious onlookers attempted to get a closer view of the crash scene.
Fortunately no one was reportedly injured in the crash.