Advertisement

Plane Comes Off Runway At Canadian Airport

Plane Comes Off Runway At Canadian Airport

A plane has come off the runway at Halifax airport after making an "abrupt" landing, Air Canada said.

A handful of images posted on Twitter showed what appeared to be the fuselage lying on its belly on the tarmac. They also showed emergency chutes were inflated.

Another picture appeared to show a smashed nose cone while other reports said the port wing was also damaged.

The airline said 23 people were taken to a hospital for observation and treatment of minor injuries after all the passengers left the plane.

Halifax Stanfield International Airport tweeted: "We are thankful no serious injuries have been reported."

Some reports said that the aircraft became entangled in overhead electricity power cables as it came in to land, but airport officials said they could not provide confirmation.

One of the relatives waiting for passengers, tweeting as CherryBerryHFX, said: "People r safe, it really is a miracle #AC624 Bounced & engine popped off, nose of plane damaged, wings off"

She added: "So proud of my new husband, caught many ppl as they evacuated #AC624 coming down the chute. Jagged metal everywhere."

The airport said its airfield remained closed.

Airport spokesman Peter Spurway said the aircraft touched down in stormy conditions.

"It came down pretty hard and then skidded off the runway," Mr Spurway said. He said he did not know whether runway conditions played a role.

There is a heavy snowfall warning in the Halifax region, with Environment Canada saying: "Visibility may be suddenly reduced at times in heavy snow."

Images from the airport's webcam showed snow on the ground and vehicles working to clear it from the taxiway.

Air Canada said a preliminary count indicated there were 132 passengers and five crew members. The flight had departed from Toronto at 9.05pm local time on Saturday and landed early on Sunday morning.

According to flight tracking service FlightAware, the plane concerned is an Airbus A320 with seating for around 150 people.

Power at the airport was briefly knocked out, but Nova Scotia Power said they had since restored it.

The cause of the outage was not immediately clear. Back-up generators were running when the flight landed and the runways were lit.

Because the power went off, an emergency response centre had to be moved to a nearby hotel.

The airport's website showed a number of flights had been cancelled on Sunday morning.