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Business News/ Politics / Policy/  Emirates flight from Kerala crash lands in Dubai, fliers safe
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Emirates flight from Kerala crash lands in Dubai, fliers safe

All 282 passengers, 18 crew members of Emirates flight EK521 were safely evacuated; firefighter killed, says Emirates

An Emirates airline flight from India to Dubai crash lands at Dubai airport on Wednesday. Photo: PTI Premium
An Emirates airline flight from India to Dubai crash lands at Dubai airport on Wednesday. Photo: PTI

An Emirates flight from Thiruvananthapuram to Dubai crash-landed at Dubai International Airport on Wednesday afternoon. None of the 282 passengers and 18 crew were reported hurt.

Television visuals showed the plane with a column of thick smoke emanating from it on the runway.

One video showed an explosion on its right wing with a part going up in the air.

“Emirates can confirm that today, 3 August 2016, flight EK521 travelling from Trivandrum International Airport in Thiruvananthapuram, India to Dubai has been involved in an operational incident upon landing at Dubai International Airport. There were 282 passengers and 18 crew on board," the airline said in a statement.

The Boeing 777 aircraft left Trivandrum International Airport at 10.19am and was scheduled to land at 12.50pm at Dubai International Airport.

Apart from Indians, there were 24 passengers from the UK, 11 from the UAE, 6 each from the US and Saudi Arabia, 5 from Turkey, 4 from Ireland, 2 each from Australia, Brazil, Germany, Malaysia, Thailand and one each from Croatia, Egypt, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Lebanon and Philippines.

“We can confirm that there are no fatalities among our passengers and crew. All passengers and crew are accounted for and safe," the airline said.

Emirates flights across the world could be delayed as much as 8 hours, the airline said.

“We are in the process of opening our customer assistance line and will share these details soon but at this stage we have no further information on what may have caused the accident. Our priority remains with the passengers and crew involved," the statement added.

Emirates has set up dedicated telephone lines for relatives of the passengers to make enquiries: 8002111 (UAE); 00442034508853 (UK) and 0018113502081 (US).

Civil aviation minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju asked Emirates on Wednesday evening to provide a helpline number in India, too.

“Have asked Emirates to set up helpline number in India. They have operationalised 09848018923 at Trivandrum," he said from his social media account on Twitter after complaints that there was no Indian number provided even though most of passengers were Indian.

The Boeing 777 plane is usually used for long-haul flights like those from India to Europe or the US.

Emirates flies several Boeing 777 flights to India, as these planes carry more passengers. Many of the passengers to Dubai, Emirates’s hub, end their journey there, but most use it as a transit hub.

Chennai-based Aviation safety analyst Mohan Ranganthan said it appears the pilots did not taken the weather report seriously and initiated a go-around without the landing gear (wheels), and the resultant ‘sinking’ crashed the aircraft to the ground.

“Weather report indicates the winds were easterly but there was a warning that it could shift to north-westerly direction. With easterly winds and landing into wind, a change in wind to northwesterly can result in loss of lift (the aircraft stays in air due to lift, while any loss of lift will result in a ‘sink’). Recovery is possible if maximum engine thrust is applied and no configuration (flaps and landing gear) changes are made. If that is not adhered to, the aircraft can sink rapidly," Ranganathan added.

A firefighter was killed while battling flames that erupted when an Emirates airline plane flying from India crash-landed in Dubai, Emirates chairman Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed al-Maktoum said on Wednesday.

Sheikh Ahmed said the authorities are still investigating the incident, in which 14 other people were admitted to hospitals with mainly minor or moderate injuries.

He said the crash-landing was not caused by any security breach.

He said the plane, which had entered service in 2003, had undergone maintenance in 2015 and that the United Arab Emirates pilot had over 7,000 hours of flying experience.

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Published: 03 Aug 2016, 03:10 PM IST
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