A sports club boss last night said it was a miracle no-one had been hurt after a concrete block fell from an aeroplane on to a city tennis court.

The one-foot square slab, used to tie down light aircraft at Newcastle Airport, fell from the sky and landed on a grass court at the Northumberland Club in Jesmond.

Horrified members of the club on North Jesmond Avenue, surrounded by houses and just yards from the busy Osborne Road, called police after the scare just before 9.30am on Wednesday.

They said the unused court where the concrete block landed was 10 yards away from the club's indoor courts. Airport staff later said the block had fallen from a light aircraft that took off at 9.20am.

It is thought the four-seater Piper Cherokee took off without removing the weight.

An investigation has been launched to find out what happened by the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA). Police were called to the tennis club at 9.53am, and the block, measuring 30cm by 30cm, was dug up and taken back to Newcastle International Airport.

Airport staff said they later identified that the block in question had come from the Piper Cherokee. Graeme Manwell, duty manager at the tennis club, said last night: "We had some contractors sitting in a van in the car park who heard a thump and saw grass being thrown into the air.

"If it hadn't landed on the grass, it could have done considerable damage. It was literally 10 metres from an indoor tennis court and 20 metres from the main club - it was a miracle really.

"When you think about where we are, the amount of houses and businesses round here, we're so close to Osborne Road, it's very lucky it landed on that spot.

"That area we use for the children's activities in the school holidays. It's very fortunate it happened when it did.

"The police who came said they couldn't believe a pilot could have flown off with it because the plane would have been so unbalanced.

"They said it would have been like a bomb had it landed on concrete."