An Emirates airline flight from India to Dubai crash-landed at Dubai’s main airport Wednesday, and all 300 people onboard survived, the airline said.
One firefighter was killed while responding to accident, said the airline's chairman and CEO said. Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum also said 10 people were hospitalized after the incident at Dubai International Airport.
The 282 passengers and 18 crew members were safe and accounted for after the accident, Emirates said, while providing no details about what happened.
Dubai-based Emirates, the Mideast’s biggest airline, said the crash-landing happened at 12:45 p.m. local time as Flight EK521 was arriving from the southern Indian city of Thiruvananthapuram.
Social media users reported smoke at the scene, and images showed a plane on fire on the airport's runway.
A passenger, Iype Vallikadan, said the pilot had announced there was a problem with the landing gear as the plane neared Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates, and he would make an emergency landing, the Associated Press reported.
After landing, the cabin crew opened all the emergency exits, and everyone was evacuated within minutes, the news agency said.
The passengers included six U.S. citizens, the airline said. Also onboard were 226 people from India, 24 from Britain, 11 from the Emirates, six from Saudi Arabia, five from Turkey and four from Ireland.
Two people each came from Australia, Brazil, Germany, Malaysia and Thailand, and one each from Croatia, Egypt, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Lebanon, Philippines, South Africa, Switzerland and Tunisia.
Boeing, the U.S. plane manufacturer, said a technical team is standing by to participate in the investigation with the National Transportation Safety Board.
Saif Mohamed Al Suwaidi, director general of Dubai's General Civil Aviation Authority, tweeted that the agency “has mobilized the investigation team” working with Emirates airlines and Dubai airport. “Our main concern is the safety and well-being of all passengers and cabin crew right now,” he said.
Emirates was founded in 1985 and has a good safety record. Dubai International is the region's busiest airport, handling 78 million passengers last year.
The airport said other flights were delayed for about six hours and resumed a little before 7 p.m. local time.
#Developing story: Plane makes emergency landing at Dubai airport. Video and updates here https://t.co/kYH4GKlFKu pic.twitter.com/j3KuhzrC9E
— Gulf News (@gulf_news) August 3, 2016
