VASCO
A tyre of an India Coast Guard Dornier aircraft burst on the runway at the Dabolim airport on Thursday afternoon, leading to a delay of several flights at the airport.
While a source at Dabolim airport claimed that the incident occurred while the plane was landing, Coast Guard officials said the flight was only undergoing routine testing at the airport.
A source at Goa Airport said the incident occurred at around 12.30 pm, when a ICG Dornier aircraft tyre burst during landing and the left tyre caught fire near N4.
“The flight was on the runway and this incident disrupted the movement of flights at Dabolim Airport. The Navy rescue team immediately reached at the spot after the incident and began the rescue and clearing of the runway,” said the source.
Meanwhile, all arrival flights were delayed for landing for a minimum of 30 minutes as per the Air Traffic Controller. There were around six arrival flights which were denied landing permission and kept on hold with chances of diversion of few flights in case of further delay.”
“At around 1.07 pm, the aircraft was towed away and the runway was cleared. The flight operations resumed after the runway was cleared by the Navy in the afternoon," said the source.
However, ICG officials denied that the flight was landing when the incident occurred.
"The incident did not occur during landing, but while the plane was doing a ground taxiing check. The aircraft had not or was not planned for flying at all and only undergoing routine tests at the Dabolim international airport,” said an ICG official.
“There was a technical snag during flight testing and the flight was held up in the runway after there was a problem with the tyres. There were no passengers and we were doing a routine taxi check and there were no injuries reported and everyone was safe."
Meanwhile, Dabolim Airport Director Dhananjay Rao did not respond to calls for more details into the incident.
