Boeing cargo plane forced to land at Istanbul without front landing gear
A Boeing cargo plane has been forced to land at Istanbul airport without its front landing gear, in the latest setback for the embattled planemaker.
Nobody was hurt in the incident, in a flight operated by the delivery company FedEx, according to Turkey’s transport ministry.
The Boeing 767 aircraft, flying from Paris Charles de Gaulle airport on Wednesday, informed the traffic control tower at Istanbul airport that its landing gear had failed to open and it landed with guidance from the tower, the ministry said.
Emergency services were standing by for the landing. The ministry did not give a reason for the landing gear’s failure and said its teams were conducting examinations at the scene as part of an investigation.
Video of the incident shows the plane’s back wheels touching down, followed by its fuselage, with sparks and smoke streaming from its underside. The plane then skids to a halt, remaining on the runway.
The runway has been temporarily closed to air traffic, but traffic on the other runways at the airport was continuing without interruption, the airport operator IGA said.
The incident comes at a time when Boeing’s safety record is under intense scrutiny, after a string of crises and safety issues.
Boeing on Tuesday said it had informed regulators about possible failures to carry out mandatory safety inspections on its 787 Dreamliner planes. The US regulator, the Federal Aviation Administration, said it was “investigating whether Boeing completed the inspections and whether company employees may have falsified aircraft records”.
It followed separate allegations by a whistleblowing engineer that Boeing took shortcuts to reduce production bottlenecks while making the 787.
The US manufacturer pledged this year to turn around its safety culture after a door panel blew out of an Alaska Airlines 737 Max plane in mid-air in January.
Boeing had been trying to ramp up production of the 737 Max, its bestselling model, to move beyond the crisis triggered by two deadly crashes in 2018 and 2019. 737 Max planes were grounded worldwide for the best part of two years.
FedEx was approached for comment on Wednesday’s incident. Boeing declined to comment.