News: Beach 1900D Emergency Landing (Amazing Photo)

This amazing photo of a Air New Zealand Beech 1900D (registration ZK-EAK) airplane doing a gear-up landing at Blenheim-Woodbourne Airport (BHE) in New Zealand after a landing gear malfunction. Blenheim is located in North-East corner of the South island of New Zealand. This photo shows pieces of the propeller and airplane disintegrating after touchdown. The airplane was originally scheduled to land in Wellington but was diverted to reduce the impact to air traffic in Wellington. There were 17 people on board (15 passengers and 2 crew) and no reports of injury.

Passenger Derek Zandbergen said “passengers were told as the plane came into Wellington that there was a problem with the landing gear. People did not panic, but the atmosphere in the cabin was subdued,” he said.

After circling the airport for about 20 or 30 minutes the crew had exhausted all their potential options for solving the gear problem, so decided to land. The co-pilot walked through the cabin checking the passengers and telling them to brace for the landing.

Article & Image Source Non-Mobile: http://www.stuff.co.nz/4099286a10.html

Tags: Airplanes, Crashes, Photos, Runways
Technorati Tags: Airplanes, Crashes, Photos, Runways