Plane makes crash landing near Levin

LANDING SPOT: Senior Sergeant Willie Roy inspects the plane at the crash site.

A middle-aged man has moderate injuries after crash landing his plane into a paddock near Levin today.

St John ambulance district operations manager Steve Yanko said the man was the pilot and sole occupant of the plane.

The man was treated at the scene for moderate head and leg injuries before being flown to Wellington Hospital by the Westpac Rescue helicopter.

The light aircraft was forced to make a crash landing in a paddock after suffering engine failure.

It was a replica of the Focke-Wulf 190 warplane. It took off from Levin and was supposed to land at Kapiti Coast Airport.

There was a full-scale emergency response at Kapiti Coast Airport when a mayday call was received from a pilot in trouble at 2.36pm.

Police, ambulances, fire trucks and Kapiti Emergency Medical Service assembled at the airport but were stood down when a message came through that the pilot had landed south of Levin.

Emergency services were still at the scene, just off Denton Rd.

The pilot called emergency services from the plane, saying he had suffered head injuries.

- © Fairfax NZ News