A Fairchild Merlin airliner on a French surveillance mission crashes in Kirkop, Malta, killing all five people on board.
On 24 October 2016, a twin turboprop Fairchild SA227-AT Merlin IVC operated by CAE Aviation crashed near Kirkop, Malta, shortly after take-off from Malta International Airport. The aircraft was to operate in the vicinity of Misurata in Libya on a surveillance mission by the French Ministry of Defence. All five people on board the aircraft died in the crash, making it the deadliest aviation accident in Malta since 1985.
The Fairchild Swearingen Metroliner (previously the Swearingen Metro and later Fairchild Aerospace Metro) is a 19-seat, pressurized, twin-turboprop airliner first produced by Swearingen Aircraft and later by Fairchild Aircraft at a plant in San Antonio, Texas.