Two workmen last night thanked ‘divine intervention’ for their astonishing escape from death as a helicopter crashed into their crane and turned into a fireball.

The pair should have been in the cabin when disaster struck, sending burning debris cascading 700ft on to the rush-hour streets of London below.

Instead, Richard Moule and his colleague Nicki Biagioni were late for work – both had overslept for the first time in years – and missed death by minutes.

The crash, which happened at 8am yesterday in fog, claimed two lives, including that of the helicopter pilot, and left 12 injured. But police said it was ‘a miracle’ that the toll was not higher after the helicopter sliced through the crane ‘as if it was a piece of paper’, scattering wreckage over the streets of Vauxhall, South London.

Pete Barnes, 50, described as one of the most experienced helicopter pilots in the country, appeared to be struggling to keep the aircraft on course as he tried to make an emergency landing in fog.

Air accident investigators are trying to establish why Mr Barnes, who had won an award for bravery as an air ambulance pilot, lost radio contact with the ground in the moments before the impact.

He had asked national air traffic controllers for permission to land at Battersea heliport next to the Thames after fog prevented him landing at Elstree, Hertfordshire, but he had veered at least 500ft off course.

Controllers at Battersea said that “at no point in time were we able to establish contact” with him, raising the possibility that he suffered a catastrophic equipment failure.

One witness said the 15-year-old Agusta A109 appeared to be “spinning out of control” seconds before it hit the crane’s jib, which had red warning lights on it and was on a list of hazards circulated to pilots.

The pilot who crashed his helicopter into a newly-built tower in central London, killing himself and a second person on the street below, was today named as experienced aviator Pete Barnes.

He had requested to divert via Heathrow air traffic control and land at Battersea Heliport, due to bad weather conditions, when the helicopter hit a construction crane at the top of the tower near Vauxhall Bridge at 8am.

Mr Barnes, 50, who flew a helicopter for James Bond film Die Another Day and had been an air ambulance pilot, was pronounced dead at the scene(...)


IMAGE ( [link to i.dailymail.co.uk] )


IMAGE ( [link to i.dailymail.co.uk] )


IMAGE ( [link to i.dailymail.co.uk] )



He contributed to filming for the BBC and Sky News, and worked on films such as Die Another Day, Tomb Raider II and Saving Private Ryan, as well as providing his services to adverts and sporting events, and has been described as one of the most experienced Agusta pilots in the UK.