All 309 passengers and crew aboard an Air France jet survived a dramatic runway crash by sliding down escape chutes from the burning plane and scrambling up a ravine during a pounding thunderstorm.
The plane skidded off the runway at Toronto's Pearson International Airport after landing at around 4pm on Tuesday in a heavy rain storm accompanied by lightning and strong winds, said Steve Shaw, a vice president of the Greater Toronto Airport Authority. The Airbus A340 slid down a slope into a wooded area that runs along Highway 401, Canada's busiest thoroughfare.
"It's nothing short of a miracle," Canada's Transport Minister Jean Lapierre said after learning everyone on board Air France flight 358 from Paris had survived.
Air France chairman Jean-Cyril Spinetta yesterday said it was too early to determine the cause of the crash but promised the airline would be "totally transparent" in any investigation. He said Air France bought the aircraft new in 1999. It was last serviced on July 15 and had log-ged 28,418 flight hours and 3,711 takeoffs and landings, he said.
Spinetta said the plane's co-pilot reported that the plane had sufficient fuel at the landing and that the runway was long enough.
Air France said 22 people were treated for minor injuries, though Shaw said 43 were hurt. Passengers said some of the injured had broken arms and legs.
The first sign of trouble came minutes before landing when the pilot aborted an initial attempt to land the plane because of the storm and powerful winds. About a minute before the plane landed, as it approached the airport for a second time, the lights in the cabin went out, passenger Olivier Dubois said.
"Just before touching ground, it was all black in the plane, there was no more light, nothing," he said.
As the wheels touched down, passengers -- their nerves frayed by the darkness inside and outside the cabin and flashes of lightning -- burst into applause.
But then the jet thudded on landing, skidded off the runway and burst into flames, passengers recounted.
"It happened so quickly; it was a little bit like being in a movie," said Gwen Dunlop of Toronto, who was returning from a vacation in France.
Dunlop said some passengers went down emergency chutes, while others just jumped out on their own.
"We were all trying to go up a hill; it was all mud and we lost our shoes. We were just scrambling, people with children," she said.
Pouring rain, lightning and thunder added to the drama.
The federal agency Environment Canada had issued a severe weather alert earlier in the day, saying its radar showed a rapidly developing thunderstorm with winds of about 96kph. Shaw said the airport had been under a "red alert" since noon, which indicates potential for lightning, but does not prevent planes from landing or taking off.
Some of the 297 passengers and 12 crew members who evacuated reached the highway crowded with rush-hour traffic.
Several hours after the crash, passengers in red blankets were taken on buses to the airport Sheraton hotel to meet relatives and friends.
Some were distressed that they had to go through customs before they were reunited.
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