pesawat terbabas di denver: 58 cedera!!

amazed

58 cedera pesawat terbabas di Denver


LOS ANGELES: Sekurang-kurangnya 58 cedera apabila pesawat Continental Airlines terbabas dari landasan sebelum terbakar ketika hendak berlepas di Lapangan Terbang Antarabangsa Denver, Colorado.

Pesawat Boeing 737 yang hendak berlepas ke Houston, Texas, itu gagal dikawal sebelum terkeluar dari landasan, kata jurucakap lapangan terbang, Jeff Green, awal pagi tadi.

Jurucakap Lembaga Keselamatan Pengangkutan Kebangsaan, Robert Sumwalt memberitahu wartawan, seramai 110 penumpang dan lima krew berada dalam pesawat ketika kejadian.

Beliau berkata, pasawat hilang kawalan sebelum terjunam ke dalam cerun sedalam 13 meter di tepi landasan.

"Sebahagian pesawat kemudian terbakar yang bermula di sebelah kanan," katanya. - AFP

amazed

amazed

Monday December 22, 2008

Firefighter recalls a miracle on a Denver runway

DENVER (AP): In a shallow, snow-covered ravine between runways, Assistant Fire Chief Bill Davis saw the hulking Boeing 737 jetliner, resting on its belly and preparing to burn up.

And its 115 passengers and crew members, calmly walking toward the lights of an airport fire station.

"It wasn't mass chaos,'' said Davis, among the first rescuers to reach the wreckage of the jet Saturday night at Denver International Airport, where it mysteriously veered off the runway during takeoff.

The emergency slides on Continental Airlines Flight 1404 had deployed. But with the landing gear sheared off, passengers simply stepped out the doors on the left side -- the right side was on fire -- and to the ground.

The Denver accident brought to mind the quick and orderly evacuation of 165 people from a China Airlines Boeing 737 moments before it exploded in Tokyo in August 2007 because of a pierced fuel tank.

It also bore similarities to an accident in Toronto in August 2005, when 309 people slid down escape chutes after an Air France Airbus A340 skidded off the runway and burst into flames.

Davis called it a miracle that no one died in Denver.

"It was just amazing,'' he said.

Thirty-eight people suffered broken bones, bruises and other injuries, but Robert Sumwalt, a National Transportation Safety Board member, didn't know whether they were caused by the impact or the evacuation. There was no official word on the possible cause.

The damaged plane will remain for several days in the 40-foot (12-meter) deep ravine, Sumwalt said. The runway it used will remain closed during the investigation.

The plane carried 110 passengers and five crew and was headed for Houston and came to a rest about 200 yards (200 meters) from one of the airport's four fire stations.

Passengers walked out of the ravine in clear, 24-degree (-5 Celsius) weather and toward the lights of the fire station nearby, Davis said. Inside, firefighters began treating the injured while other passengers held small children or stared into the distance.

Passenger Emily Pellegrini told The Denver Post that as the plane headed down the runway, "It was bumpy, then it was bumpier, then it wasn't bumpy.''

The plane veered off course about 2,000 feet (600 meters) from the end of the runway and did not appear to have gotten airborne, city aviation manager Kim Day said.

Firefighters said they doused the blaze quickly and then searched the cabin to make sure no one was trapped.

Firefighters stayed at the wreckage all night, occasionally putting out flare-ups that erupted in the fuel-soaked baggage in the cargo hold.

Anyone unlucky enough to have been trapped in the cabin probably wouldn't have survived the thick smoke, Davis said.