The Halifax airport in Canada was closed for about 90 minutes on Saturday night after an Air Canada plane arriving from St. John’s, experienced a landing issue that caused it to skid off the runway, with part of the aircraft catching fire.
According to CBC News, a passenger, Nikki Valentine, recounted that one of the plane’s tires failed to deploy correctly during landing.
“The plane started to sit at about a 20-degree angle to the left and, as that happened, we heard a pretty loud — what almost sounded like a crash sound — as the wing of the plane started to skid along the pavement, along with what I presume was the engine,” Valentine explained.
She described how the plane continued to skid down the runway for a “decent” distance while the pilots tried to bring it to a stop.
“The plane shook quite a bit, and we started seeing fire on the left side of the plane, and smoke started coming in the windows,” she said.
According to a statement from the airport, the incident involved Air Canada Flight 2259, operated by PAL Airlines, and occurred around 9:30 p.m. AT. A spokesperson for PAL Airlines referred further comments to Air Canada.
Peter Fitzpatrick, a spokesperson for Air Canada, confirmed that the plane suffered a “suspected landing gear issue” after its arrival. The plane was unable to reach the terminal, and both the crew and 73 passengers were safely off-loaded by bus.
Valentine, who said the flight was nearly full, noted that it took up to two minutes to evacuate everyone from the plane.
“One side of the entire plane was on fire, so everyone was pretty much in a hurry to get off — but an organized hurry,” she said.
Although passengers appeared to have avoided life-threatening injuries, Valentine mentioned the experience clearly shook them. Fitzpatrick added that no injuries were reported among the passengers, but a spokesperson for the Nova Scotia RCMP, who responded alongside paramedics, confirmed minor injuries.
The airport confirmed that one of its runways has since reopened. Four flights were diverted, and there were several cancellations and delays while the airfield remained closed.
This comes after no fewer than 179 out of 181 people on board Jeju Air flight JT618 were confirmed dead in a tragic plane crash at Muan International Airport, South Korea, on Sunday.
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