MALANG: An Indonesian air force plane crashed into a house on the main island of Java on Wednesday, killing both people on board and two people in the house, a senior official said.

The plane was on a routine maintenance flight when it crashed near Abdul Rahman Saleh air force base in Malang, a hilly town in East Java province, said air force chief Air Marshal Agus Supriatna.

Supriatna said the pilot ejected from the Brazilian-made Embraer EMB 314 Super Tucano plane before it crashed, but a technician failed to do so.

The pilot was found dead near a rice field about 2 kilometres from his parachute, while the technician’s body was recovered from the plane’s cockpit, which was buried in the rubble of the destroyed house. He said a man and a woman living in the house died while being treated at a hospital.

Air force officials had previously believed that the technician ejected before the plane crashed.

A neighbour who witnessed the crash, Slamet, told MetroTV that the plane appeared to be nose-diving out of control with smoke billowing from its tail when it crashed. Like many Indonesians, Slamet goes by a single name.

The light attack aircraft is one of 16 bought by the air force in 2013. Malang is 850 kilometres east of Jakarta, Indonesia’s capital.

Published in Dawn, February 11th, 2016