Updated 12.35pm, adds background

An Armed Forces of Malta helicopter was forced to make an emergency landing in a field in Qrendi on Thursday. 

Nobody was injured and the landing was coordinated, according to Home Affairs Byron Camilleri through a Facebook post. 

Camilleri said the crew of the Alouette III helicopter is being given the necessary assistance by the AFM Medical section

In a statement later, the AFM its helicopter crew were conducting a routine emergency landing training drill when they had to carry out an emergency controlled landing into a field in the area surrounding Qrendi.

It said its technical experts will now look into the incident to determine the exact causes of the incident.

Alouette single-engined helicopters – easily recognisable by the whine of their turbine – have been flying in Malta’s skies since 1979, when they formed part of a Libyan military mission based here.

In August 1980, relations between Libya and Malta took a nosedive when Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi sent a patrol boat and a submarine to stop Maltese oil exploration in an area Libya claimed as its own.

Maltese Prime Minister Dom Mintoff promptly ordered the Libyan military mission to leave immediately.

Three Libyan Alouette helicopters were left behind in Malta, but they could not be flown because their logbooks were missing.

They spent a decade in a hangar before the all-important documents were handed to the Maltese government.

The helicopters were then overhauled in France – where they were made – and returned to service in 1992.

In 1996, the AFM acquired a further two Alouettes from the Royal Netherlands Air Force, and some of the older helicopters were retired and used for spares.

The AFM Air Wing recently also bought more modern Augusta Westland helicopters.