Japan Airlines plane fire – live: Five coast guard crew dead after Tokyo airport crash
Plane is believed to have been hit by another aircraft
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Five people were killed and a pilot was seriously injured following a collision between a passenger plane and a coastguard aircraft in Japan.
The Metropolitan Police Department of Tokyo said five crew members of the coastguard aircraft MA722 were killed after a Japan Airlines collided with it when flying into Tokyo’s Haneda airport.
The aircraft was heading to western Japan to deliver aid to those caught up in the New Year’s Day earthquake that has killed at least 48 people.
Live footage on public broadcaster NHK showed the Japan Airlines (JAL) Airbus A350 aircraft bursting into flames as it skidded down the tarmac at around 6 pm.(0900 GMT).
It was later overwhelmed by the blaze despite feverish efforts by rescue crews to control the fire. All 379 passengers, inlcuding eight children and 12 crew members, escaped unscathed.
Footage and images shared on social media showed passengers shouting inside the smoke-filled cabin and running across the tarmac away from an evacuation slide.
Cause of crash unknown, Japanese government says
The cause of the collision is unknown and authorities are investigating, Japan’s minister for Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism said.
“The root cause of the accident has not been analysed yet,” Tetsuo Saito said. “We will continue looking into the cause and make sure this doesn’t happen again.”
Aircraft crew had a ‘high sense of duty’ Japanese prime minister says
The five aircraft crew members killed in a collision with a passenger jet had a “high sense of duty”, Japan’s prime minister said.
Prime minister Fumio Kishida said the disaster, which happened as the aircraft was travelling to western Japan to help those affected by an earthquake, was a “very dissapointing” and saddening situation.
The earthquake which happened on New Year’s Day has killed at least 48 people. Mr Kishida added that authorities were working to ensure the crash wouldn’t obstruct rescue efforts.
Here are some of the latest photos from Tokyo
Below are some of the latest photos coming from Tokyo after the fatal plane collision
Passenger on board exploded plane describes the flaming cabin as ‘hell’
Below are some quotes from a passenger onboard the Japan Airlines flight that exploded into flames after landing in Tokyo.
Swede Anton Deibe, 17, who was travelling with his sister and parents, told Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet that “the entire cabin was filled with smoke within a few minutes”.
He said: “We threw ourselves down on the floor. Then the emergency doors were opened and we threw ourselves at them.
“The smoke in the cabin stung like hell. It was hell. We have no idea where we are going so we just run out into the field. It was chaos.”
All flights in and out of Tokyo Haneda cancelled for the rest of the day – but overnight flights from the UK are continuing
Following the crash at Tokyo Haneda, all flights in and out of Japan’s biggest airport are cancelled for the rest of the day.
Figures obtained by The Independent show 61,000 arriving and departing passengers were expected at Haneda airport, which is one of the busiest in Asia.
An estimated 15,000-20,000 passengers will have their journeys disrupted by the closure of the airport.
The two morning departures from London Heathrow to the airport are going ahead as normal. The expectation is that operations will recommence by Wednesday morning, local time, when the British Airways and Japan Airlines are due to land.
Multiple passengers injured in Tokyo plane crash
More than a dozen passengers on board a commercial flight that caught fire as it landed in Tokyo airport have been injured, local officials have confirmed.
The Tokyo Fire Department said at least 17 crew members and passengers on Japan Airlines Flight 516 were confirmed to be injured.
They were 379 passengers, including eight children and 12 crew members, on board the one and half hour flight from Shin-Chitose airport on the mountainous northern island of Hokkaido to Tokyo.
Five members of a second plane caught up in the fire have been reported dead.
London Heathrow flights arrive at Tokyo safely before Japan Airlines crash
The two late-afternoon arrivals from London Heathrow touched down as normal at Tokyo Haneda before the crash involving a Japan Airlines Airbus A350 and a coastguard aircraft.
Japan Airlines flight JL44 touched down from London slightly ahead of its scheduled 5.20pm arrival.
All Nippon Airways flight NH212, flying the same route, was scheduled to land 20 minutes after the plane involved in the crash. But it also arrived ahead of time.
Passengers from both flights will have been going through airport formalities when the crash happened. Those with onward flight connections will find themselves temporarily unable to travel.
Flight operations at Tokyo Haneda have ceased while emergency workers deal with the crash.
With firefighters involved in the aftermath, no arrivals or departures can take place.
Dozens of flights have been cancelled, while others that were in the air en route to Tokyo have diverted.
The main diversion airport is Tokyo Narita, a leading international gateway to Japan. But capacity is limited, so a large number of flights have returned to their starting points.
All passengers of Japan Airlines flight escape without life-threatening injuries
All the passengers on board the Japanese Airbus A-350 plane that caught fire after touching down in Tokyo have escaped without life threatening injuries, the flight provider Japan Airlines has confirmed.
There were 379 people on board Flight 516, they said, including 367 passengers. Among them were eight children.
All on board escaped without serious injury.
Six coastguard members were on board a second plane affected by the fire. The status of five of them remains unknown while the pilot is unhurt.
Footage from inside burning Japan Airlines plane shows moment aircraft catches fire
2023 was safest year ever for aviation
The crash at Tokyo Haneda took place two days after the end of what was the safest year on record for commercial aviation, writes The Independent’s Travel correspondent, Simon Calder.
There were fewer aircraft accidents and deaths in 2023 than ever before.
Only two fatal accidents occurred during the 12 months, compared with six in 2022.
In both crashes, propeller aircraft came down on domestic flights, with a total of 86 deaths – fewer than half the 178 fatalities in 2023. For comparison, 148 people die in the average hour on the world’s roads according to the latest UN figures.
No fatal aircraft accidents involved international flights or passenger jets.
In a civil aviation safety review for the Dutch air-safety organisation To70, senior aviation consultant Adrian Young writes: “Both the number of accidents and fatalities are at a record low.”
The fatal accident rate was less than one in 15 million flights – three times better than the 10-year average.
Air safety 2023: How safe were the last 12 months for flying?
No scheduled passenger jets were involved in fatal crashes in 2023
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