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Emirates flight crash lands in Dubai, all 300 on board safe
DUBAI/THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: An Emirates flight from India with 300 people on board crash landed at Dubai’s main airport on Wednesday, sending black smoke billowing
DUBAI/THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: An Emirates flight from India with 300 people on board crash landed at Dubai’s main airport on Wednesday, sending black smoke billowing into the air and halting traffic at Middle East’s busiest airport for nearly five hours.
There were no fatalities and all the passengers were safely evacuated before the plane — EK 521 — was engulfed in a fireball.
There were 226 Indians on the flight, besides 24 Britons, 11 Emiratis, and six each from the United States and Saudi Arabia and 18 crew members.
Though the cause of the accident was not immediately known, the plane’s landing gear is believed to have malfunctioned before landing.
Dramatic television footage showed thick black smoke coming out of the centre of the Boeing 777 while the fuselage appeared to be lying on the runway with escape slides opened. Moments later, a huge fireball engulfed the plane, the footage showed. The top of the aircraft was scorched brown from near the cockpit back to its tail. Several yellow fire trucks were seen surrounding the plane, hosing down the flames with water jets.
RELIEF IN KERALA
In Kerala, family members of those on board the flight heaved a sigh of relief as TV channels flashed news of all passengers’ safe evacuation.
One of the passengers HT spoke to over phone lauded the cabin crew for deft handling of the situation.
“While we were about to land, there were some jerks. Even before the aircraft came to a halt, fumes and smoke started blowing from the rear side of the aircraft. (The) crew swung into action in no time and all were evacuated in 90 seconds. (The) crew were last to desert the burning craft,” said Dr K Shaji, who was travelling with his family.
NEAR-MISS FOR TWO INDIGO FLIGHTS
MUMBAI: Two Indigo flights with at least 100 fliers each veered 25 seconds away from crashing into each other mid-air due to turbulent weather in Guwahati on Tuesday.
The flights involved were a Mumbai-Guwahati flight (6E813) and a Chennai-bound one (6E-136) from Guwahati.
The airline spokesperson said four passengers complained of giddiness and two crew were given first aid.
