The location of the crash was a marshy area adjacent to farmland near Berg (then an independent municipality, nowadays part of Kampenhout), four miles northeast of Brussels. Eyewitnesses said that the plane exploded when it hit the ground and heavy black smoke was seen coming from the wreckage which had burst into flames. Theo de Laet, a young farmer and noted amateur cyclist, who was working in a field near to the crash site, was killed by a piece of aluminum shrapnel from the plane. Another field worker, Marcel Lauwers, was also hit by flying debris which amputated part of his leg.