KATHMANDU: A Turkish Airlines jet caught fire while landing at Nepal’s main airport on Monday (May 11), causing no reported injuries but forcing the airport to shut down.
The flight from Istanbul landed at Kathmandu’s Tribhuvan International Airport with fire and smoke on the right landing gear. Emergency crew responded and controlled the fire and passengers were safely evacuated, according to airport officials.
The airport was shut down on Monday morning.
There were 277 passengers and 11 crew members on board the Airbus 330 jet.
“Fire was visible during the landing. Investigations are ongoing. All passengers are safe,” Gyanendra Bhul, a spokesman at Nepal’s civil aviation authority, told AFP.
Several planes bound for Kathmandu were put on hold while officials were investigating and attempting to clear the only runway available at the airport.
Bhul said the incident caused the runway to close for almost two hours in the morning, but it has since been reopened.
Turkish Airlines said passengers were evacuated via emergency slides after “smoke was observed coming from the landing gear during taxi”.
“A technical inspection of our aircraft has been initiated by our authorised teams,” Yahya Ustun, a spokesman for Turkish Airlines, said in a post on social media.
“Initial examinations indicate that the smoke was caused by a technical malfunction in a hydraulic pipe.”
An additional flight has been scheduled for the return leg of the service.
Nepal experiences relatively frequent plane crashes as its mountainous terrain and variable weather make flying conditions difficult.
In 2015, a Turkish Airlines jet landing in dense fog in Kathmandu skidded off a slippery runway, shutting down the airport for several days.
No injuries were reported, and the plane was later towed out of the airport and converted into a museum.
