Two die as plane plunges into car

Four middle-aged men cheated death after a small plane crashed into their Mazda 323 and nose-dived into the busy R55 next to the Swartkops race track, near Centurion last night.

But the two men in the Cessna plane died at the scene, according to Colonel Samuel Kilian, station commander at the Erasmia police station.

"At the scene, we determined that the two-seater Cessna aircraft took off from Swartkops air force base on a routine flight. The four men in the car saw it come down rapidly before it hit their car and crash into the ground at around 6.35pm," Kilian said.

Three of the men in the cream-coloured car suffered minor injuries and were treated for shock.

The windscreen of the car was shattered and its roof dented. Its right-hand side also showed deep dents.

Traffic flow on the Pretoria-bound carriageway only began to ease up at around 8pm - one-and-a-half hours after the crash. The plane belonged to a private company nearby.