EXPLAINER
Delta flight 4819 originating from Minnesota crash lands at Toronto airport amid strong winds and snowstorm but all 80 survive.
A Delta Airlines plane has crash-landed in Toronto, Canada’s largest city, but all 80 people on board have survived.
At least 18 people were injured after the plane flipped upside down as it landed at Toronto Pearson International Airport on Monday amid windy weather following a snowstorm.
Here is more about the crash that adds to a series of recent aviation mishaps.
What happened and when?
Delta flight 4819 originating from Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport in the US state of Minnesota crash landed on the runway at about 3:30pm (20:30 GMT) on Monday.
The plane CRJ900 was manufactured by Canadian aerospace company Bombardier. While the aircraft burst into flames, prompting fire crews to extinguish them, the fuselage of the plane remained largely intact.
Social media footage showed people leaving the flipped plane and walking across the tarmac, shielding themselves from snowfall and strong winds.
What caused the aircraft to flip upon landing?
Experts say a plane flipping upside down is unusual, but not unknown. They speculate that this happened due to the snowy, windy Toronto weather.
Aviation expert Scott Hamilton told Newsweek magazine that the strong winds and snow could have played a role in flipping over the plane. He added that flipping can be caused by factors including weather conditions, speed of approach, anomalies in braking and thruster viability.
“We’ve seen a couple of cases of takeoffs where aeroplane have ended up inverted, but it’s pretty rare,” John Cox, CEO of aviation safety consulting firm Safety Operating Systems in St Petersburg, Florida was quoted as saying by The Associated Press news agency.
Cox, who was a pilot, flew with US Air for 25 years and said the CRJ900 is equipped to handle weather like this. He said among the questions that need to be answered is why the crashed aircraft was missing its right wing.
While authorities have not revealed the exact cause of the crash, Toronto was experiencing winter storms with strong winds and heavy snow.
Around the time of landing, strong gusts of 65 km/h (40 mph) were blowing through the snow. About 22cm (8.7 inches) of snow blanketed the airport over the weekend. Snow had also fallen the week before.
Audio recordings revealed that the control tower warned the pilots of a potential “bump” in air flow upon approach.
What do we know about the passengers?
There were 76 passengers and four crew on the plane.
Toronto Pearson Fire Chief Todd Aitken said 18 injured passengers were taken to hospital.
However, Ontario-based air ambulance service Ornge said on Monday that a child, a man in his 60s and a woman in her 40s were critically injured. It said the child was taken to Toronto’s SickKids hospital and the adults were taken to other hospitals in the city.
What is the current status of the investigation?
The Transportation Safety Board is putting together a team of investigators to probe the crash.
While flights have resumed at the airport, authorities warn there could be operational delays since two runways have been closed for investigation.
In a late news conference on Monday, Aitken said: “The cause of the crash is still under investigation and being led by the Transportation Safety Board. It’s not appropriate for us to comment at this time.”
What have authorities said?
Canadian authorities held two news conferences but did not provide details on why the crash took place.
Deborah Flint, the CEO of Greater Toronto Airports Authority, said people on board had “relatively minor injuries”.
“17 injured passengers were taken to local area hospitals. At this time, we do not know of any of those passengers having critical injuries,” she told reporters at a news conference.
“No airport CEO wants to have these types of press conferences but this is exactly what our emergency, our operations and our first responders are all practised and trained for,” she added.
“And again, this outcome is due in part to their heroic work and I thank them profusely.”
The airport provided an update later that an 18th passenger had been transported to hospital.
Flint’s account differs from what Ornge Air Ambulance said about three critically injured passengers. It is unclear why the accounts of the conditions of the injured differed.
