Kaohsiung International Airport was temporarily closed yesterday after a passenger aircraft burst its tires while making an emergency landing.
No injuries or casualties were reported.
Officials at the Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) and the Aviation Safety Council said they were investigating the cause of the accident.
PHOTO: CNA
The MD-90 aircraft, carrying 36 passengers and six crew members, was taking off to fly from Taoyuan International Airport to Kaohsiung when the accident occurred, officials said.
TAKE-OFF PROBLEMS
After detecting abnormalities in the tire pressure and cabin doors soon after the plane took off at 8:45am, the pilot immediately notified air traffic controllers at Kaohsiung International Airport of the situation, they said.
Two minutes later, the Taoyuan control tower informed the captain that they had found debris on the runway and asked the captain to inspect the aircraft.
The Taoyuan airport was temporarily closed and did not resume operation until 9:51am.
As the plane approached for landing at Kaohsiung, air traffic controllers saw that one of the aircraft’s tires had burst.
They instructed the pilot to keep the aircraft in the air to burn most of its remaining fuel and prevent a potential explosion during landing, the airline said.
Because of pressure imbalances caused by the missing tire, two other tires burst when the plane landed at 9:55am, causing the aircraft to veer off the runway.
Besides the burst tires, engineers said that the right-wheel door was missing and the door for the left wheel was damaged.
The Aviation Safety Council will conduct further investigations on the incident, the CAA said.
The aircraft, owned by EVA Air subsidiary Uni Air, safely flew back to Taoyuan in the afternoon after having the three damaged tires replaced.
CLOSURE
Kaohsiung International Airport, which was forced to close temporarily because of the accident, reopened at 2:20pm, airport officials said.
More than 40 flights were delayed because of the closure, aviation officials said.
Nieh Kuo-wei (聶國維), spokesman for EVA Airways Corp (長榮航空), said by telephone: “A flat tire is a common occurrence, and there could be many reasons behind it.”
“EVA cannot comment on the cause of the incident until the CAA’s investigation results are released,” Nieh said.
Nieh declined to comment any further.
Additional reporting by Shelley Shan and Jerry Lin
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