A plane with 379 people on board caught fire while landing at Tokyo Haneda Airport and all passengers were evacuated. The cause was a collision with a military aircraft in which five crew members died.
The images are impressive. A passenger plane caught fire on the runway of Tokyo Haneda Airport this Tuesday, January 2, at 5:47 p.m. local time (9:47 a.m. French time). According to initial information, it was Japan Airlines flight JL516 from Sapporo.
【羽田空港日本航空の機体が炎上】
” https://t.co/UGWveQ1hVi#nhk_video pic.twitter.com/s4YDQhcfll– NHKニュース (@nhk_news) January 2, 2024
Live images from the airport showed passengers exiting the plane as it sat on the runway before the cabin was completely charred. According to public television, the 367 passengers of this Airbus A350-941 and the twelve crew members were evacuated. The accident was caused by a collision with a Japanese Coast Guard aircraft that was en route to deliver aid to the earthquake region. Five crew members of the military aircraft were killed in the collision, and the captain apparently managed to escape. “It is unclear whether a collision occurred or not. “What is certain is that our aircraft is involved,” said a coast guard official at Tokyo Haneda Airport.
A team of experts from the French Civil Aviation Investigation and Analysis Office (BEA) is expected in Japan this Wednesday to take part in the investigation into the cause of this collision between the Airbus A350 that had just landed at the airport and the Japanese coast Guard Bombardier Dash 8 was preparing the start. The French BEA actually participates in the technical, so-called safety investigation of aircraft abroad, especially when it acts as the competent authority of the country where the aircraft was built. The A350 is produced in Toulouse in southwest France. Japan Airlines has 16 copies.
Tokyo Haneda Airport is closed for the time being and flights are being diverted. It is one of the Japanese capital's two international airports and one of the busiest in the world. Airplane accidents are extremely rare in this country. The worst disaster occurred in 1985 when a Japan Airlines plane crashed between Tokyo and Osaka, killing 520 people, one of the world's worst aviation disasters.
To update : Addition at 4 p.m. following the arrival of a team from the French BEA this Wednesday.