SWABI, Jan 22: The students of the Ghulam Ishaq Khan Institute of Engineering Sciences and Technology had a narrow escape when a T-37 Jet Trainer aircraft of the Pakistan Air Force crashed here on Tuesday.

The pilot, Raja Jehanzeb, was killed. Another person, Asif Khan, who had come to the institute from Topi city to collect tree branches for fuel purpose, was also killed when he was hit by pieces of the aircraft.

Students and other people were inside the nearby faculties and other buildings of the institute when the plane crashed inside its premises. The aircraft was on a routine operational training mission, officials said.

District police officer Zebullah Khan told journalists that the crash apparently occurred due to technical fault.

It was learnt that two T-37 Jet Trainer aircrafts had taken off from Risalpur at 12.20pm. When they reached near the Tarbela Dam region one of them developed a technical fault. The pilot tried to make an emergency landing somewhere but he could not, sources said.

The aircraft crashed a few yards from the Habib Bank campus bench and near the faculty of mechanical engineering and the faculty of materials science and engineering.

“There were 35 students in the bank when the crash occurred. The fire created panic among students and staff, bank manager Mohammad Arshad told Dawn.

“Windowpanes of the Fluid Mechanics Lab, Solid Mechanics Lab and the CNC Lab in the faculty of mechanical engineering were smashed. Now it is unsafe as the laboratories are equipped with costly equipment,” said an official of the faculty.

A medical team of the PAF picked up the body of the pilot.

When TV channels aired the news, people from all over the country started calling the institute to know about their children.