BREAKING News : Plane Crash At Pearson Airport

[True_Snake]

Yahoo! News Article:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/cpress/20050802/ca_pr_on_na/plane_crash

Air France jet in flames outside Toronto's Pearson airport

13 minutes ago

TORONTO (CP) - An Air France passenger jet skidded off the runway and burst into flames Tuesday while trying to land in stormy weather at Toronto's Pearson International Airport.

Officials would not say how many passengers were injured, but police said a pilot and a number of passengers were taken to hospital. Sgt. Glyn Griffiths reported other injured passengers were walking around the crash site. "A pilot has gone to hospital and they were picked up on the 401 and a number of other passengers were wandering around the area so we're trying to head them off," Griffiths reported.

"I haven't got any information on casualties at all."

Officials would not say how many passengers were on board the jet when it crashed in a wooded area in view of Highway 401, Canada's busiest highway Monday afternoon.

One report said 200 people had been on the plane. Another said the jet was an A340, which can transport as many as 350 passengers.

Black smoke billowed from the aircraft, which one witness said had split in two.

"I would say the thing is broken in half from the wing part, we're obviously going to have casualties," witness Eddy Mets, who is also an aviation expert, reported.

Reports said that it was Air France flight 358 travelling from Paris to Toronto that went down.

With little information available on injuries, dramatic scenes of the crash site were broadcast live on Canadian and American news channels.

A portion of the plane's wing could be seen jutting from the trees as smoke and flames poured from the middle of its broken fuselage. At one point, another huge plume of smoke emerged from the wreckage, but it wasn't clear whether it was from an explosion.

A row of emergency vehicles lined up behind the wreck, and a fire truck sprayed the flames with water and foam.

Police said the jet that was attempting to land when it ran into trouble in driving rain. Lightning strikes were also spotted in the area.

"An Air France plane landing on runway 2-4 went off the end of the runway (in) the area of Convert Drive and the 401 area in Mississauga," said Griffiths, of Peel Regional police.

The airport had been operating under vigilant security measures in the wake of deadly bombings in London.

No reports of deaths yet. I'm about 15 minutes from Pearson; VERY severe weather here today. Lightining all over the place! :o

Reports have it that authorities arrived within 50 seconds to the scene.

Details coming in...

Picture from a near-by traffic cam:

http://us.news3.yimg.com/us.i2.yimg....jpg?x=380&y=289&sig=Yf69xUit4h0j7_Z3rLFWHg--

UPDATE: ALL ACTIVITY FROM PEARSON AIRPORT HAS BEEN HALTED; no incoming flights, and of course no outgoing flights right now. The plane crashed right next to Canada's BUSIEST highway, 401.



True_Snake

 

[HHDomains]

So if everyone on that plane was French and they all died in the crash you wouldn't have cared?


Also, there are many airlines with worse records than Air France. Do you guys actually know that stats or are you just going by this accident and the concorde accident?

 

[IRoNiK]

Leave it to the French to mess up a perfectly good day.

 

[slaughterbeck]

Personally I Dont Care about the french, their fancy wines and cheeses, or anything else but if there were canadians onboard then i hope it went down softly ,lol...

We all belong to the same race.

 

[True_Snake]

It's not the French's fault. It's the weather; and we can't really control the weather (other than by cutting down on greenhouse gasses and reducing the spread of Global Warming but some people don't understand).

It was one of the worst storms I've ever seen; there were reports that lightining had hit the plane and the lights in the plane went out. Could that have affected the brakes; no power? Who knows?

Glad everyone's okay.


True_Snake

 

[Sabre]

It's not the French's fault. It's the weather; and we can't really control the weather (other than by cutting down on greenhouse gasses and reducing the spread of Global Warming but some people don't understand).

It was one of the worst storms I've ever seen; there were reports that lightining had hit the plane and the lights in the plane went out. Could that have affected the brakes; no power? Who knows?

Glad everyone's okay.


True_Snake

Yeh, i sure as hell wouldn't have wanted to be out in that

Is it still as bad there? Or the weather has calmed down?

I would hope so, or metal plane, plus water, plus lightening, may have equaled electical water vapour

 

[zaros64]

FREAKY.. No wonder nobody died? how did they survive? this is going to be on the news

 

[Sabre]

FREAKY.. No wonder nobody died? how did they survive? this is going to be on the news

It IS on the news.. worldwide....

Live feeds are on BBC now, for British people, when they wake up in a couple of hours

 

[True_Snake]

The weather is WAY better now.

Some of the wet roads have dried up and I think Pearson Airport is returing to normal. Amazing how 309 people survived it. Everyone got out before the plane caught fire. Great response by the authorities.

Folks not in Toronto or Canada can watch a local Toronto TV Station, CP24.
Goto http://www.pulse24.com/Front_Page/page.asp and scroll down; on the right it'd say "CP24 LIVE". Under that, click the link that reads "Watch CP24 live"


True_Snake

 

[ThreeD]

good to hear that there were no casualties! Just shows how professional the entire situation was taken care of

 

[Crusader]

Apparently the plane hydroplaned as it was taxing down the runway (the wind was really strong and pushed her along) and some say that lightning had struck it at the same time.

The CBC is saying there were no casualties as the passengers somehow got out of the plane before any fires started.

 

[True_Snake]

The black box was retrieved this morning and it's gone to Ottawa where it'll be 'downloaded' and they'll see what happened.

Also, there were 2 car accidents on the 401 as motorists were looking at the wreckage. They're referred to as "rubbernecks" and/or "gawkers".


True_Snake

 

[budget]

My conclusion on this is : Don't fly on Air France! Really don't! They have a bad history...

That may be true but i have used them many times without a single problem apart from one delay due to snow in paris,And they charge a fraction of BA prices.

 

[LeetPCUser]

Yeah that was on last night. Nobody got killed so that is good...french and canadians in an accident...hmmmm what do us statespeople think?

 

[True_Snake]

.french and canadians in an accident...hmmmm what do us statespeople think?

They think: "We need to learn from their emergency response teams!" :D


True_Snake