The Transportation Safety Board is investigating, after a flight from Calgary to Grande Prairie was forced to land in Edmonton Thursday night.
Jazz Air flight AC 8481departed from Calgary, and officials said a tire was blown during take-off – which forced the plane to land at the Edmonton International Airport at about 8:36 p.m.
“Right when we were taking off there was a bang and a scraping noise,” passenger Lisa Neville said.
A total of 75 people were on the flight at the time, 71 passengers and four crew members.
Lee Swaile was one of the passengers on the flight, and said they could feel the aircraft shaking during take-off.
“It kind of shook everybody up a bit,” Swaile said. “Then about…10 [or] 15 minutes, maybe a little bit longer, they came on and told us that one of the tires had blown out on our take-off, but said it would be perfectly fine to land with so they were just diverting us to Edmonton.”
Swaile said the passengers thought everything on board was fine, until the plane touched down.
“Once we touched down, it just all went haywire from there,” Swaile said. “[We] crashed down, you could just feel the plane grinding into the ground and people were screaming, and just kind of holding on for dear life.”
Neville described how the plane tipped during the emergency landing.
“I think the landing gear and the tire broke off, because it tipped right over on the wing,” Neville said.
A witness, who did not wish to be identified, told CTV News they were concerned the aircraft was “going to blow up because of all the sparks”.
Paramedics and 11 ambulances were dispatched to the scene, but Alberta Health Services told CTV News that only three passengers had to be taken to hospital with minor injuries.
Officials with Jazz couldn’t say whether a blown tire and the collapsed landing gear are connected, but one expert said they could be.
“So it can cause subsequent failures if it was a tire that caused the initial problem,” Aviation consultant John McGraw said in a Skype interview with CTV News.
The plane is a Bombardier Q-400 – the same type of aircraft grounded by Scandinavian Air back in 2007 due to multiple crashes involving landing gear failures.
However, the airline stands by their planes.
“The Q-400, both the original and the next generation aircraft, are extremely robust,” David Deveau with Jazz Aviation said. “So we have no concerns about the gear.”
Most of the passengers on that flight were eventually flown to Grande Prairie by Air Canada Jazz Thursday night, while some were put up in hotels in Edmonton.
Swaile credited the pilot for getting the craft on the ground safely.
“It almost felt like it was going to get to the point where you might roll, but the pilot must have done a hell of a job, because he kept things going and got us off to the side,” Swaile said. “I think it’s when we got off the runway we just kind of tipped right over and stopped.”
One runway at the airport was closed to allow Transportation Safety Board officials to investigate, Airport officials said the runway needed to be inspected for debris or damage before it could be reopened.
“[The TSB] will do that once its cleared we will look to clear the runway for safety, to make sure there is no damage or debris or other problems,” Heather Hamilton with the Edmonton International Airport said. “In the meantime, we are using our second runway so other flights should not be impacted.”
Officials told CTV News the affected runway may be reopened by midnight.
With files from Laura Tupper and Bill Fortier
