Swedish man survives helicopter crash on 100th birthday

A Swedish man celebrating his 100th birthday with a helicopter ride survived with minor injuries when the helicopter crashed shortly after taking off yesterday in central Sweden.

Carl Zetterlund, who turned 100, was to fly to the Stockholm archipelago with his son, grandson and 7-year-old great-grandson from a nursing home in Heby, a small town about 100km northwest of Stockholm, police said.

But something went wrong shortly after the helicopter took off, and its rotor blades clipped a tree and a lamppost before the aircraft went down in a cloud of dust and smoke.

The four family members, along with the pilot and a nursing home worker on board, escaped with cuts and bruises. Relatives had chartered the helicopter as a birthday gift.