Sky Angkor Air flight tyres pop on landing

FOUR tyres of the main landing-gear wheels of a plane burst after skidding for 100 metres upon landing at Siem Reap International Airport at about 5:15am yesterday morning, according to airport concessionaire Cambodia Airports.

The Siem Reap-bound Airbus-320, which flew from Dalian, China, was operated by local carrier Sky Angkor Airlines.

Cambodia Airports communications director Khek Norinda said yesterday that runway operations had resumed by 9am and Cambodian civil aviation officers were investigating the incident.

“None of the 122 passengers on board were injured,” he said.

Lee Moon Seap, the airline’s ground operations general manager, maintained yesterday that the crew had reported that “all the passengers felt very normal during landing”.

Just over a week ago, a Sky Angkor flight to Hefei, China, had to return to Siem Reap due to cabin pressure problems.

Sinn Chan Serey Vutha, spokesman for Cambodia’s State Secretariat of Civil Aviation, speculated that yesterday’s incident occurred due to faulty brakes. “It is our primary assumption that the braking system did not function properly on the runway. Our air safety team is investigating the case; the result will come out in a week,” he said, adding that the plane had been checked according to standard operating procedures before take-off.

“The passengers disembarked [via stairs],” he said. “We then closed the runway for two hours to change the tyres . . . There was no damage to the runway.”