Emirates Crew Said Aborting Landing To 'Go Around.' Then, Disaster

Dubai :  After an Emirates jetliner arriving from India caught fire after slumping onto the runway in Dubai on Wednesday, one firefighter died in the intense blaze.

All 300 passengers -most of them from Kerala - and crew were safely evacuated from the gutted Boeing 777-300 after a crash that  survivors described as terrifying.

"We left by going down the emergency slides and as we were leaving, on the runway, we could see the whole plane catch fire. It was horrifying," said passenger Sharon Maryam Sharji.

According to air traffic control recordings cited by Aviation Herald, a respected independent website monitoring air accidents, controllers at Dubai reminded the crew of the Boeing 777 to lower the landing gear as it came into approach.

Shortly afterwards, the crew announced they were aborting the landing to "go around," a routine procedure for which pilots are well trained. But the aircraft came to rest near the end of the runway instead, Aviation Herald reported.

It was not immediately clear whether the landing gear was extended by the time the aircraft touched the ground at around 0845 GMT, though a family of passengers who declined to be named said the wheels did not deploy and the jet landed on its belly.

Amateur video posted on Twitter appeared to show the plane sliding on its belly moments after landing, with its right engine torn away from its usual position under the wing.

Both the airline and aircraft have a solid safety record. It is the first time an aircraft operated by Emirates has been damaged beyond repair since the carrier was founded in the 1980s.

Investigators will scour the wreckage and interview pilots, controllers and witnesses for clues to any technical malfunctions, human error or weather-related problems.

According to specialist aviation weather reports, at the time of the accident temperatures at Dubai International airport were up to 49 degrees Celsius (120 degrees Fahrenheit) and wind shear - a potentially hazardous condition involving sudden and unpredictable changes in wind direction or speed - was indicated on the airport's runways.