A student pilot and his instructor were injured when their helicopter crashed after a “rushed” landing at Denham Aerodrome, an investigation has found.

Shocked eyewitnesses reported seeing two men being pulled from a training helicopter that had landed on its side at the Hangar Road airfield on November 2 last year.

The pair had suffered cuts when the helicopter, a Robinson R44 Raven II, crash landed and the windscreen smashed just before 3pm, an investigation by the Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB) has revealed.

The report said the student pilot, who was training for his helicopter private pilot’s licence, was practising his take-off and landing techniques when the crash happened.

After several take-offs and landings were carried out to a “good standard”, the student repositioned the helicopter to make a landing near the start of the runway.

The report claims the instructor felt the landed was a “bit rushed”, considering the “uneven nature of the surface” and the student immediately began to lift off and attempt the landing again.

As the helicopter lifted, it starts rotating to the right – and the instructor tried to counter it by applying the left pedal.

The helicopter then rolled to the left and the rotor blades struck the ground before it came to a rest on its side.

The student rushed out of the helicopter to help get the instructor out of the aircraft.

The report added: “The instructor stated that he had previously emphasised to the student the need for a gentle two-stage lift into a hover and that he may have been ‘lulled into a false sense of security’ by the student’s good performance at the beginning of the lesson.”

At the time of the crash, eyewitnesses recalled hearing a “thud” before seeing a helicopter blade “fly in the air”.

South Central Ambulance Service sent an ambulance, the air ambulance, a tactical advisor and a paramedic team leader to deal with the incident.