Air Canada flight lands after scare
TO TORONTO
A Toronto-bound Air Canada plane made an emergency landing at Madrid’s international airport after pilots reported an engine problem and a tire rupture shortly after take off.
The Boeing 767 carrying 128 passengers circled southeast of Adolfo Suarez-barajas Airport for about four hours “to use up fuel and lighten the aircraft for landing,” the carrier said on Monday.
The “engine issue” occurred shortly after takeoff, according to Air Canada. “A tire also reportedly ruptured on takeoff, one of 10 on this model of aircraft,” the carrier reported.
Ignacio Montesinos, a spokesman for Spain’s airport operator, said the pilot radioed the tower citing an “emergency.”
Madrid residents posted videos online showing a plane flying unusually low over the Spanish capital’s centre and suburbs, as it readied to eventually touch down safely.
“Our pilots are fully trained for this eventuality,” Air Canada said in an email. “Nonetheless, an emergency was declared in order to obtain landing priority.”
Spanish outlet El Pais posted images to Twitter said to be taken from inside the plane.
The outlet said an F-18 fighter jet, which had been scrambled to inspect the Air Canada plane, returned to base after taking photos of the damage to its underside and speaking with the pilot.
Eventually Flight AC837 landed safely in Madrid. There were no reported injuries, the airline said, adding customers were being accommodated in hotels and rebooked on other flights.
A spokeswoman with Spain’s airport operator, AENA, told The Associated Press that the airline had requested a slot for an emergency landing some 30 minutes after taking to the air.
A spokesman for Enaire, Spain’s air navigation authority, said the plane’s landing gear did not fold up properly on takeoff and that a piece of it may have damaged part of one of the engines.
Emergency services including firefighting trucks and ambulances had been deployed at the Spanish capital’s airport as a precaution.
Benoit Gauthier, a retired Air Canada pilot who flew for 37 years, said the tire rupture and engine problem are “most likely” connected.
“When a tire ruptures on takeoff, there’s always a remote chance that it explodes and some part of the rubber ends up in the engine,” he said in a phone interview with The Canadian Press.
The engine problem likely triggered the return to airport, he said. “If you’ve lost an engine, you don’t want to cross the Atlantic. You want to land,” Gauthier said.