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The flight path of the Cessna can be viewed on the flight tracking website FlightRadar24.photo by Flight Radar 24
September 4 (UPI) – A private Cessna plane crashed in the Baltic Sea off the coast of Latvia on Sunday after NATO jets scrambled to follow the plane, officials said.
The Austrian-registered plane took off from Jerez in southern Spain at around 12:56pm GMT and was supposed to land in Cologne, Germany, the Danish newspaper Bild reported.
A cabin pressure problem was reported shortly after the plane took off, and officials lost contact with the plane after it left the Iberian Peninsula.
The fighter jets first took off from Spain and France to assess the situation, but the pilots could not see anyone in the cockpit or cabin, Bild reported. A man, a woman and their daughter are believed to be on board, along with a pilot.
Two Eurofighter jets took off from Germany’s Rostock-Lage airfield as the Cessna passed Cologne, where it was intended to land, but it was also impossible to determine what happened inside the Cessna and closed after the island of Rügen.
Denmark then sent an F16 fighter jet to escort the Cessna, which pilots saw it spin and crash off Latvia at about 7:45pm, according to Bild.
Plane reportedly briefly entered Swedish airspace before crashing Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter.
The Swedish Maritime and Air Rescue Centre told Dagens Nyheter that a rescue helicopter found wreckage and an oil slick in the water and that no survivors were expected in the crash.
Lithuanian Air Force Spokesperson tell the mirror That NATO plane also took off from the NATO Baltic Air Force Police mission at Amari Airport in Estonia.
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