Sources said the training aircraft PT-6 with its lone pilot flight cadet wing under officer Taniul Islam, 20, nose-dived into the field in Baharampur village of Kotchandpur, 30 kilometres off Jhenidah district town, at about 11:35am.

Taniul died on the spot.

Our correspondent in Kushtia reports: Taniul's training fighter took off from the Jessore Air Force Academy at 10:45am.

At 11:05am, Taniul informed the ground control tower about some technical faults in the plane's engine, sources said.

After a while the control tower lost all communication with the aircraft.

The plane then circled a few times over the field before crashing.

Locals said they heard a loud sound from the paddy field and ran to the spot and saw the destroyed aircraft.

Ataur Rahman, assistant teacher of Baharampur Secondary School, told our Magura correspondent that he went to the spot immediately after the accident and saw the body of Taniul was still trembling inside the cockpit.

A fire brigade team from Jhenidah rushed to the spot and recovered the body of Taniul.

Hearing the news, Squadron Leader of the Jessore base Abdul Gaffar and Group Captain M Morshed Hasan Siddiqui rushed to the spot.

They suspected that technical faults in the engine might have caused the accident.

Air Force chief Air Vice Marshal Fakhrul Azam also visited the spot in the afternoon.

A three-member investigation committee was formed headed by Group Captain Morshed. The committee was asked to submit its report within 48 hours.

Police were deployed at the spot.

Taniul, son of Md Sirajul Islam and Hosne Ara Begum, hailed from Hajiganj of Chandpur district and joined the Air Force as a flight cadet on July 20, 2004.