NAHA, Japan, 21 August 2007 — A China Airlines jet exploded into flames at an airport in Okinawa after arriving from Taiwan yesterday, but all 165 people aboard escaped alive. Police said terrorism was not suspected.
All 157 passengers fled the Boeing 737-800 unhurt on inflated emergency slides just minutes before the plane burst into a fireball, Transport Ministry official Akihiko Tamura told reporters.
The aircraft skidded on the tarmac on its way from the runway to the gate after landing, starting a fire that prompted the emergency evacuation, according to China Airlines spokesman Sun Hung-wen. The eight-member crew also safely left the plane, Sun said.
“The fire started when the left engine exploded a minute after the aircraft entered the parking spot,” Tamura said, adding that airport traffic controllers had received no report from the pilot indicating anything was wrong.
National broadcaster NHK showed footage of the plane bursting into flames just seconds after what it said was the last crew member escaping from a rear door. The plane’s pilot was also seen jumping out of the cockpit window as the plane exploded. “After the plane landed, there were flames, and I heard explosions a few times, then saw black smoke,” airport worker Hideaki Oyadomari told NHK. “We felt the hot air coming our way.”
Nobody was injured. Local fire official Hiroki Shimabukuro said two passengers — a seven-year-old girl and a man in his 50s — had been hospitalized because they felt unwell, but not because they were injured.
Several passengers interviewed by NHK said they were suddenly told to use the emergency slides to evacuate as they were preparing to get off the plane after what seemed like an ordinary landing.
