The relatives, friends and colleagues of the two pilots who were killed in the horrific F-16 crash that occurred during a NATO training exercise in Albacete, Spain, earlier this week, will say their last goodbyes at the two men’s funerals. According to a press release of the General Staff of the Hellenic Air Force, Flight Lieutenant Panagiotis Lascaris’ funeral will take place today at noon at the Church of Aghios Antonios in Rizoupoli, Attica and the funeral of Flight Lieutenant Athanasios Zagas will take place at 3.00 pm in the church of Aghia Varvara in Argiroupoli, Attica.

The remains of Panagiotis Lascaris and Athanasios Zagas, who died in the line of duty, were transferred to Athens early on Thursday with a C-27J transport aircraft of the Greek Air Force.

The fighter jet was participating in a pilot training program for armed forces of NATO member-states, the Tactical Leadership Program (TLP). The F-16 belonged to the 341 Squadron of the 111th Combat Wing of Nea Aghialos and had been redeployed at the Los Lllanos airbase as part of said training program which takes place in the airbase from January 19 to February 13. For the same reason, Greece has redeployed to the Spanish airbase three more F-16 Block 50 fighter jets and 41 air force staff.

In all, 10 people died (eight French soldiers amongst the dead) and 19 were injured, when the airplane fell on parked aircraft during take-off. The aircraft “suffered a loss of power and crashed on an aircraft hangar … causing damage to other aircraft which were there, ” said the ministry spokesman.

Firefighters were trying to battle the blaze which erupted in the airbase and had sealed off the entire area, to prevent the fire from expanding.

A group of Greek Civil Aviation experts are still investigating the area, which has been cordoned off due to the presence of toxic chemicals, in order to assist Spanish authorities.

“What we know is that the F-16 crew, fairly quickly, right after the takeoff, tried to eject,” Denis Mercier told journalists.

“It is an incredibly improbable accident to have an aircraft that has an engine breakdown at takeoff, flies sharply off course and falls right on top of aircraft which are getting ready to fly, so are full of fuel,” he said. “It is a series of unlucky events.”

Mercier said he knew the air base well, and that there was no safety or organisational problem.

“It was completely bad luck,” he said. “A few metres further and there would have been a different outcome.”

“There was not much more to be done on boosting safety,” he said.

The Air Force will hold a day of mourning on Monday, while President François Hollande has set Tuesday as a national day of mourning, with an official ceremony at Les Invalides, the military museum here.

The two men were experienced pilots with more than 1,000 flying hours.