REPORTS of a plane crash in Mauchline saw dozens of emergency service crews scrambling to investigate on one of their busiest nights of the year.

Police were alerted by a member of the public shortly after 3.30pm last Wednesday, Bonfire Night, claiming that a light aircraft was flying dangerously low over the Lochside House Hotel, New Cumnock and heading in the direction of Mauchline.

Scottish Fire and Rescue (SFR) scrambled 13 appliances with around FIFTY firefighters on the scene.

Appliances were called in from as far away as Glasgow and Kilmarnock before being stood down once it was established that it was a false alarm.

Police Scotland had six officers at Mauchline Games Hall with more en route before being stood down. A police dog and handler were also en route before also being stood down.

SFR had also received reports of smoke near the A76 between Mauchline and Tarbolton that turned out to be false.

In fact, the light aircraft landed safely in a controlled and scheduled landing at a private landing strip in a field near the Mauchline.

Police Scotland confirmed to the Chronicle that they have spoken to the pilot and that nobody was injured and there was no damage to the aircraft.

The sight of the vast numbers of emergency services gathering at the games hall prompted locals to take to Twitter in an attempt to find out what had happened.

Watch Commander, Alan Coughtrie, of Scottish Fire and Rescue said: “It was a very quick response from ourselves and everyone was ready to do the job. When we take a call such as this one we have to just look at it as if it has actually happened, when we got the call on Wednesday we weren’t to know it was a false alarm so we got there very sharp. Everything went well from our end and thankfully it was a false alarm and nobody was hurt.” Ian Mchallam said on the Chronicle Facebook page: “Excellent response from our emergency services, great to hear that it was a false alarm.”