Passengers, crew escape fireball on Japan Airlines plane after airport collision

SOURCE: Reuters – All 379 passengers and crew of a Japan Airlines (JAL) plane miraculously escaped from a fire following a collision with a Coast Guard aircraft at Tokyo’s Haneda airport on Tuesday, but five of the six crew of the coast guard plane were killed.

The Coast Guard said the collision involved one of its planes that was headed to Niigata airport on Japan’s west coast to deliver aid to those caught up in a powerful earthquake that struck on New Year’s Day, killing at least 48 people.

“I felt a boom like we had hit something and jerked upward the moment we landed,” a passenger on the Japan Airlines flight told Kyodo news agency. “I saw sparks outside the window and the cabin filled with gas and smoke.”

It was later overwhelmed by the blaze despite feverish efforts by rescue crews to control the fire. But not before all 367 passengers and 12 crew were evacuated.

Japan’s Transport Minister Tetsuo Saito confirmed that five of the coast guard aircraft’s crew had died. The captain of the plane escaped but was injured.

NHK, citing the Tokyo Fire Department, said at least 17 of the people evacuated from the passenger plane were injured.

A transport ministry official told a press briefing the JAL plane was attempting to land normally when it collided with the coast guard’s Bombardier-built Dash-8 maritime patrol plane on the runway.

There had been no reports of engine or other problems on the aircraft before it landed, the official said. ( Reuters)

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