Japan Airlines plane carrying nearly 400 passengers bursts into flames after collision; 5 crew members killed
A passenger plane carrying nearly 400 people burst into a ball of fire at a Tokyo airport Tuesday when it collided with a coast guard jet — killing at least five crew members taking aid to victims of a deadly earthquake.
Horrifying video showed the Japan Airlines plane suddenly burst into flames after touching down at Haneda International Airport — with the fireball spreading across the runway as it came to a stop.
Five crew members on the coast guard plane died while their captain was critically injured, officials told NHK.
All 379 people on the passenger plane managed to escape despite the jet becoming fully engulfed and quickly collapsing. However, at least 17 passengers were injured, according to the Metropolitan Police Department, which did not elaborate on their conditions.
“The entire cabin was filled with smoke within a few minutes,” Swedish passenger Anton Deibe, 17, told Aftonbladet.
“We threw ourselves down on the floor. Then the emergency doors were opened and we threw ourselves at them.
“The smoke in the cabin stung like hell. It was a hell,” added Deibe, who was traveling with his parents and sister.
Footage and images shared on social media showed passengers shouting inside the smoke-filled cabin and running across the tarmac away from an evacuation slide.
“I felt a boom like we had hit something and jerked upward the moment we landed,” a passenger on the JAL flight told Kyodo news agency. “I saw sparks outside the window and the cabin filled with gas and smoke.”
The inferno blazed for six hours before it was extinguished.
Police are expected to investigate the accident on suspicion of professional negligence, NHK television reported.
The flight had received permission to land from aviation officials after making the 550-mile trip from the Chitose airport near the city of Sapporo, Japan Airlines officials maintained.
Japan Airlines Managing Executive Officer Tadayuki Tsutsumi told a news conference late Tuesday that the packed passenger plane was making a “normal entry and landing” on the runway, without specifying how it collided with the coast guard plane.
The Transport Ministry Civil Aviation Bureau, however, claimed the collision occurred when the passenger plane landed on one of the runways where the Coast Guard aircraft was preparing to take off.
The coast guardd pilot reported to his base that his aircraft exploded after colliding with the commercial plane, Vice Commander told reporters.
The coast guard aircraft and its six occupants were en route to Niigata Airport to deliver aid to those caught up in a powerful earthquake that struck on New Year’s Day, killing at least 48 people, military officials said.
Transport safety officials were analyzing communication between aviation control officials and the two aircraft and planned to interview Japan Airlines officials to determine what led to the collision.
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida instructed relevant agencies to coordinate to assess the damage, according to his office.
Haneda, one of Tokyo’s two main airports, has closed all runways following the incident, a spokesperson said.
With Post wires
