Private jet crashes in Buenos Aires, killing pilot and co-pilot

The wreckage of a Challenger 300 aircraft that crashed upon landing in the town of San Fernando, Buenos Aires Province. Photo / AFP

A private jet has crashed into a residential area in Argentina, killing the pilot and co-pilot.

The plane hit a house and caught fire near San Fernando airport, in a northern district of the capital of Buenos Aires.

A 73-year-old man, who owned the house, has also been taken to hospital. More casualties have not been ruled out, according to reports.

Reports suggest the family-owned Challenger 300, a mid-sized business jet, lost control as it came in to land and overshot the runway.

The private jet appeared to speed up in an attempt to take off again, but instead left the runway and crashed into the house at high speed.

Video captured by a camera overlooking the runway showed the aircraft overshot the tarmac before exploding into a plume of smoke.

“The plane landed too far down the runway and for some reason could not brake, and ended up crashing into houses next to the airport,” one witness at the scene told the Buenos Aires Herald.

A Challenger 300 aircraft crashed landed in the town of San Fernando, Buenos Aires Province. Photo / AFP

Images of the aftermath showed the plane in flames before it was put out by firefighters. Aerial photos of the crash site show the outline of the aircraft, its nose and tail fins still partly intact, but separated by a blackened wreckage.

The plane was flying from Punta del Este, Uruguay. According to local news outlet Clarin, it was owned by the family of Jorge Brito, president of the River Plate football club.

A firefighter inspects the wreckage of a Challenger 300 aircraft that crashed upon landing in the town of San Fernando. Photo / AFP

Another witness who lived near the crash site told Clarin that she feared she and her family were going to be killed by the aircraft.

“We thought we were going to die. It was a very ugly despair. What hurts me is that I lost my daughter’s things. I was with her and my sister, we got out of there in a hurry. If my brother hadn’t broken the wall, we wouldn’t have got out,” the woman, who is pregnant, said.

She told the local outlet that they had been “sitting with my grandmother” when they saw the plane “coming at full speed”.

Picture of the wreckage of a Challenger 300 aircraft that crashed upon landing. Photo / AFP

“We heard it. We were in the yard, and we saw it coming from behind the bars. It was coming straight at us. We started running to the back. If we didn’t break the wall, we would have died there with the plane.”

The official cause of the crash remains under investigation.