Posted on 12/22/2009 9:05:01 PM PST by AtlasStalled
An American Airlines plane crashed and broke in two after landing at the Norman Manley International Airport in Kingston shortly after 10 p.m. Tuesday, according to local reports. There were no immediate reports of casualties.
Details were not immediately available, however, passengers on the plane told local media that flight 331 had just arrived from Miami in pouring rain when the accident occurred. The flight apparently originated in Washington, D.C.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Prayers...
OMG
I’ve been on that flight more than once.
CNN says 145 passengers, 7 crew members, origin DCA (Reagan Nat’l here in Northern Virginia) with stop at MIA (Miami). All passengers have exited the plane, which overshot the runway at KIN (Kingston).
http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/americas/12/22/jamaica.plane/
Evac in progress, I guess that can be a good sign... a passenger was on her cell phone (via Fox on the Net).
Yes, it sounds like everybody’s all right.
From Flyertalk:
AA 331 crash landed at 10:30 pm, went off runway in very bad weather
It’s a 737-800 carrying 145 pax and 7 crew. A posting notes AA has withdrawn the “No Injuries” release.
Close call mon.
Now that everyone’s safe, I can refer to my own pet peeves: why can’t headlines use English? It’s not “Jamaica,” but “Jamaican.” LaGuardia is also a “Jamaica airport.” Kingston is a “Jamaican airport.”
no problem mon
Kingston Weather at Crash Time. Very bad...
Note the Dew Point/Temp spead.
MKJP 230400Z 32014KT 11500 +SHRA BKN014 FEW016CB SCT028 BKN090 21/18 Q1013 RERA
MKJP 230300Z 32008KT 33000 +SHRA BKN014 FEW016CB SCT030 BKN100 21/20 Q1014 RETSRA
MKJP 230228Z 31009KT 5000 TSRA BKN014 FEW016CB SCT030 BKN100 22/19 Q1013
MKJP 230200Z 30012KT 5000 SHRA BKN014 SCT030 BKN100 22/20 Q1013 RERA
Very bad weather. And that temp./dewpoint spread is very close!!
Oh mon, that’s scary stuff.
All passengers have exited the plane,
################
Great news!!
From memory thats a small airport. Prayers
Actually Kennedy Airport is in Jamaica Queens. Laguardia is bordered by Astoria, Jackson Heights and East Elmhurst.
Have you been to the distillery in Lynchburg, Tenn.? They serve mighty delicious lemonade after the tour!
” LaGuardia is also a “Jamaica airport.””
I always thought it was in the human sewer called New York!
Prayers.
There obviously were survivors speaking to media, so hopefully they all made it out despite what sounds like a horrific crash with the plane breaking in half.
Funny you mention that, in 1989 at that airport they greeted me with Rum Punch!
or Flushing/Corona. Definitely not Jamaica (Queens)
Thank God.
It usually is if it's raining... heavy rain even moreso.
No, it’s in America, in a city where hundreds of brave firefighters and policemen lost their lives in their heroic efforts to rescue their fellow man.
plane crashed and broke in two and all passengers exited safely? That doesn’t compute but glad everyone appears to be OK, I think
Wx really doesn’t seem “that” bad. 1400’ broken layer. A good ILS, approach lights and rabbits should have helped to prevent the “long landing”, more to the incident.
Back in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s, some airline pilots referred to La Guardia Airport as “La Garbage Airport.” And this was while they were talking to the passengers before landing!
It reminds me of of the F-100 Crash at Little Rock 10 years ago.
Get-there-itis, perhaps?
Damn!
MORE INFO:
Aircraft is N977AN(ACARSD), built 2001.
You never really know for sure till they put the parts back together and listen to the tapes. But you can certainly assume that it was a “hard landing” to break the airframe into.
thx
“Wx really doesn’t seem “that” bad.”
Note the “+SHRA”. Lots can happen after you land in the TDZ with +SHRA. Loss vis on the rollout, or just hydroplaning off the side of the runway. It happens.
Of course, you sound like you’re in the business so you know this. The apparent fact that there were no fatalities (we’ll see about that), indicates it wasn’t a terribly violent deceleration, though it’s tough to break a ‘37 (keel beams are a good thing) so it must have absorbed quite a lot of abuse before it cracked. Still, if you bust a fuselage, the chance of fatalities are pretty good unless you were barely moving when it happened. I hope it’s one those rare cases where they didn’t croak anyone.
From Airliners:
Live radio broadcast from KIN is reporting that 3 passengers are seriously injuries and are now being treated at the Kingston Public Hospital. The news report also says the emergency service is now activated and the airport is now closed.
So far there are no fatalities reported.
From another aviation Forum.
RWY 12 has an upslope for the last 300 feet.
The a/c went through the fence and onto the road, which the change in elevation probably caused a break in the center fuselage, at a low speed.
Sometimes you just get lucky. Hopefully, that luck will stay with the folks that went to the hospital. Like I said, a ‘37 can take a horrendous amount of abuse before it cracks (HP into the approach lights at DFW, bounced and flew to IAH, SW at AMA in heavy rain, SW excursion aborting after V1). Lots of folks are still kicking because of the way that thing was/is built.
I fear something from the MD-80 family would not fare nearly as well.
SIDE NOTE:
A Virgin Airways flight, running 14 hours late, was just pushing away from the gate when this happened, and the airport closed.
I get your point that anything can happen but that is a lot of what-ifs for +RW with a detectable ceiling and vsby. My initial comment was based on the “bad wx” report. If he had the mins to start the approach...
Quick...ban planes and take over healthcare!!
Aren’t aircraft beams used to support limos? They must be pretty strong.
lol! Thanks for the laugh.;^)
I think that the upslope was a good thing in this case.
Which means it never should've landed there. Sounds like the crew had a serious case of get-there-itis.
You got that right.Boeing builds the toughest birds and this goes way back.
Rum punch is served on almost all Caribbean islands, in tourist stores (the little mall near Dunns River Falls for instance), at points of interest - just everywhere. I remember a liquor store in St. Thomas giving samples of liquor so you'd know if you liked what you were buying.... of course that was many years ago.
PS - is it me or does it look like a local shaman is there blessing the already cracked plane?
Thankfully doesn’t look horrible. Possible it “cracked” or “creased” at slow speed, rolling off the runway whereby part of the plane was on the ground while the other ‘half’ was hanging over a small ravine. If the plane’s fuselage somehow teetered on that ledge-like looking surface (rock wall?) it would teeter-totter until it cracked, no?
Was the Hun even flying 10 years ago? It must’ve been somebody’s private toy.
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