A small plane has crashed after take-off at Southend Airport, sending a fireball into the sky.

Essex Police and East of England Ambulance Service are responding to the incident at the airport this afternoon.

The passenger plane is reportedly a Beechcraft King Air B200 that was leaving the airport for Lelystad in the Netherlands.

In a statement, Essex Police said: "We were alerted shortly before 4pm to reports of a collision involving one 12-metre plane.

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"We are working with all emergency services at the scene now and that work will be ongoing for several hours. We would please ask the public to avoid this area where possible while this work continues."

Labour MP for Southend West, David Burton-Sampson, has responded to the incident. Writing on X, he said: "I am aware of an incident at Southend Airport. Please keep away and allow the emergency services to do their work. My thoughts are with everyone involved."

Matt Dent, Southend City Council's cabinet member for business, culture, music and tourism, posted on X: "My thoughts are with all those involved, and with the emergency services currently responding to the incident."

EasyJet is among the airlines to use London South Airport as a base. The airline, which runs 122 flights per week across 20 routes, has cancelled its four evening flights to Paris, Alicante, Faro and Palma de Mallorca.

All flights have been cancelled, according to the airport's departure board.

It shows the 3.55pm flight to Paris was cancelled, as was the 4.30pm flight to Alicante and the 5.25pm to Faro and the 5.30pm flight to Palma de Mallorca.

No other flights were expected on Sunday.

EasyJet warned that because the airport is closed, all flights for the remained of the day have either been diverted to alternative airports or have been cancelled.

Flights scheduled for Monday are appearing as 'on time' on the Southend Airport departure board.