Passengers on-board QF974 said “masks dropped just before plane made rapid descent” Picture: Twitter
Source: Twitter
A QANTAS jet plummeted 9km in five minutes yesterday after its crew noticed the aircraft was not maintaining normal cabin pressure.
There was about 150 people on flight QF974 from Brisbane when the Boeing 737-800 lost cabin pressure and was forced to land about 45 minutes into their journey.
It is understood passengers were told to brace for a “rapid decent” when the plane plummeted about 30,000ft in about five minutes.
Townsville resident Jason Henderson, 25, said it as an hour he would never forget after fearing for his life.
“It was definitely the scariest day of my life and the worst thing I have been through,” he said.
“I was shaking a bit and there were people crying.
“People didn’t know how to react, everyone was quite quiet and in shock.
Start of sidebar. Skip to end of sidebar.
End of sidebar. Return to start of sidebar.
“Nobody knew what was happening.
“There were a few moments where I definitely thought that was it and it was unfortunate I was sitting there by myself next to people I didn’t know.”’
The incident has been reported to the Civil Aviation Safety Authority and the Australian Transport Safety Bureau and an investigation has been launched.
The flight touched down in Rockhampton at 3.30 pm and engineers examined the aircraft.
The passengers then boarded a replacement aircraft which was sent from Brisbane and arrived in Townsville at about 10pm last night.
A Qantas spokesman said the crew acted as per standard procedure after detecting something was wrong.
“During the flight the crew detected that the aircraft was not maintaining its normal cabin pressure,” the spokesman said yesterday.
“In-line with standard procedure, the Captain initiated a descent to 10,000 feet.
“Passengers were advised that because the aircraft wasn’t maintaining its normal cabin pressure, they would fly at a lower altitude and divert to Rockhampton instead of continuing to Townsville.
Mr Henderson said he feared the plane was headed for an emergency landing in open water as it circled the sky before it made a “standard landing”.
“The pilot came over the speaker and told everyone to prepare for turbulence and as he was saying it the masks dropped down and we started going down pretty fast,” he said.
“I’m not too keen to get on another plane, that’s for sure.”
Townsville traveller Allan Ahwang said he was struck with overwhelming relief when they hit the tarmac.
“We knew it was leaking pressure from somewhere but we didn’t really know what was going on and we were all just thinking `what do we do now`,” he said.
“As soon as we hit the ground, there was a big cheer out loud from everyone.
“The pilot did a fantastic job.”
Tiffany Church, 21, described it as “something out of a movie”.
“I wasn’t sure what was happening, this usually happens in movies and I never would think that it would happen in my life but it did,” she said.
“There was a smell like an exhaust burning through the plane, I’m not sure what it was.”
The passengers praised the efforts of the pilot and Qantas staff for keeping them calm.
“They seemed very well trained in the aspect of an emergency when they probably have never had to go through that before,” Mr Henderson said.
“They were composed and once we were at a safe height they were very attentive to make sure we were all ok and comfortable.”
Qantas jet plummets 9km in five minutes
Không có nhận xét nào:
Đăng nhận xét