A light aircraft piloted by Romanian businessman Dan Petrescu crashed into an empty office building outside Milan on Sunday, killing him, his wife and his son, as well as all five passengers aboard.
The single-engine Pilatus PC-12 took off from Milan’s Linate airport just after 1:00 p.m. (1100 GMT) on its way to Olbia, Sardinia’s northernmost city.
According to the aviation agency ANSV, which has launched an inquiry, the plane crashed just a few minutes later in San Donato Milanese, a town southeast of Milan.
Witnesses said the plane was already in flames before it crashed into an office building undergoing renovations.
Petrescu, 68, was Romania’s wealthiest man. He was the CEO of a big construction company and the owner of a chain of hypermarkets and shopping complexes. According to the newspaper Corriere della Sera, he was also a German citizen.
Deputy prosecutor Tiziana Siciliano was quoted by Corriere as saying that the plane’s black box had been recovered.
