Close shave for passengers in Delhi as plane touches another before take-off
NEW DELHI: The tail of a Patnabound Jet Airways plane clipped the starboard wing of the airline’s flight for Srinagar when both aircraft were taxiing for take-off at the New Delhi airport on Sunday afternoon.
The 260 passengers and crew in the planes are safe, but they survived a major scare as the wings of an aircraft carry large quantities of highly-inflammable jet fuel that can explode during a collision and reduce the flight into a fireball.
This is the first case in many years of two aircraft colliding at one of India’s busiest airports, which handled 82 flights in an hour last November, breaking its record of 77 take-offs and landing, according to civil aviation officials. An airport official said the two planes were schedThe uled to depart five minutes apart from runway 29.
“Srinagar-bound flight 9W603 was moving towards the runway to take off at 2.50 pm with 129 passengers and eight crew members; as was flight 9W730 for Patna, scheduled to depart at 2.45pm, with 115 passengers and an eight-member crew. They hit each other on taxiway.”
impact damaged the right main wing of the plane to Srinagar, and the other plane’s tail wing.
An emergency was declared after the accident, and lifesavers were scrambled.
But the damage was not much and the two aircraft moved back to the parking bay, without the help of tow trucks.
Passengers were shifted to replacement planes. Flight operations at the airport were not affected by the 30-minute emergency.
Jet Airways said the crew members of both planes were grounded, pending an investigation.
“All guests and crew are safe.” The airport had its share of near-misses and accidents, the latest being the April 26 incident when a catering van crashed into an Air India plane and damaged its door.