Passenger plane crashes into fence at Gatwick Airport

Flight to New York temporarily grounded as passengers forced to evacuate damaged plane

A Norwegian Boeing 787 Dreamliner was taken out of service at Gatwick after crashing into an airfield fence (Simon Calder)

A plane operated by airline Norwegian was damaged after hitting a fence while being moved from its departure gate at Gatwick, the carrier said.

The incident involved a Dreamliner aircraft scheduled to depart for New York at 9.50am on Monday.

As it was being pushed back ahead of flight DI7017, it collided with a fence, damaging a cone which contains the auxiliary power unit at its rear.

Passengers disembarked without incident and boarded a replacement aircraft.

The damaged plane was taken out of service.

A Norwegian spokesman said: "We would like to apologise to our customers for the inconvenience."

PA