Two Indian Air Force pilots were killed when a training …..

Admin.CEO 27 August, 2026News & Updates, Pakistan News

Two Indian Air Force pilots were killed when a training plane crashed in Kanpur.

KANPUR – A routine training flight in Kanpur, India, ended in tragedy when a twin-engine Teknam jet crashed in a field, killing both the instructor pilot and the trainee on board.

Indian police identified the dead as instructor pilot Sachin Bhatia from Gujarat and trainee pilot Abhishek Pujari from Karnataka.

Both pilots were killed when the training plane crashed in Kanpur.
Kanpur plane crash: The plane belongs to Garg Aviation which runs a flying school from Civil Aerodrome. pic.twitter.com/N8ClsqniJB

— Shakeel Yasarullah (@yasarullah) August 27, 2026

The two pilots took off from the local Garg Aviation Training Center around 11:30 am when the plane was reportedly returning to the training center when it crashed in a field at around 11:50 am, just 20 minutes after take-off.

Bhatia, who had gained nearly 3,000 hours of flying experience with trainee pilot Pujari, was killed in the crash. After the incident, police and emergency teams reached the accident site. Authorities cordoned off the area and recovered the bodies of the two pilots.

The aircraft was a four-seat, twin-engine Tecnam that was brought to the Garg Aviation Training Center in 2023 specifically for pilot training.

The sudden crash has raised questions about what went wrong during the short training flight. However, authorities are yet to determine the cause of the accident.

The incident has been reported to India’s Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), which will conduct a detailed technical investigation of the aircraft and determine the circumstances that led to the fatal accident.

India has seen several major aviation events in recent years involving commercial, military and training aircraft. In June 2025, Air India flight AI171 crashed shortly after takeoff from Ahmedabad, killing 260 people.

Earlier this year, IAF Mirage 2000 and Jaguar fighter jets were involved in separate accidents, while a PC-7 trainer and a Tejas fighter also crashed in November. In June, a Cessna 152 training aircraft crashed in Kasganj after an alleged technical fault, injuring the trainee pilot. In August, an Air India A320 experienced a hydraulic emergency but landed safely, injuring two dozen people.