An Emirates Airline flight from Thiruvananthapuram to Dubai crash-landed at the Dubai International Airport on Wednesday. The flight had 275 passengers and crew on board.
“We can confirm flight EK521 from Thiruvananthapuram to Dubai has been involved in an accident at Dubai International,” Emirates tweeted, confirming the incident.
All passengers were evacuated safely and no injuries have been reported so far, Dubai media office tweeted.
All the runways of the Dubai airport have been closed for any take-offs and landings.
The Twitter account of live air traffic monitor Flightradar24 said take-offs and landings at Dubai had been suspended because of the incident, adding that the plane involved was a Boeing 777-300 A6-EMW.
A pilot who witnessed the incident told that he saw the plane coming in fast and hit the runway tail first.
“We saw big flames, then the body hit the runway and the right landing gear collapsed, followed by the right engine coming off. Then it skidded for a while until it stopped,” the pilot said.
Dubai-based Emirates said the incident happened at 12.45 pm local time (845 GMT) on Wednesday.
Pictures purportedly showing the incident posted on social media showed a thick black plume of smoke rising from the top of a burning plane.
Dubai International is by far the Mideast’s busiest airport, and is the world’s busiest air hub in terms of international passenger traffic.
The aircraft involved in the incident is a Boeing 777. The wide body jetliner has been in the news in the past as well. It was the same make and model as Malaysia Airlines flights MH 370 and MH 17.
