Earlier today, a Turkish Airlines Airbus A330 had to be evacuated in Kathmandu due to a fire that started on the plane.
Information and imagery has been revealed pertinent to the accident at hand.
Without further ado, let’s get into it…
Turkish Airlines Flight TK726 – Istanbul to Kathmandu…
Turkish Airlines flight TK726, which suffered the fire, was a routine scheduled flight between Istanbul and Kathmandu.
It is understood that the aircraft involved in the incident was TC-JNP.
As per data from Planespotters.net, TC-JNP is a 14.1 year old Airbus A330-300 that was delivered to the airline back in April 2012.
Of the A330-300 variant, the airline has 37 of them in their fleet.
Within the 37, 30 are in active service, and seven are parked, with an average fleet age of 12.4 years.
As well as the A330-300, the airline has the following other aircraft in their mainline fleet:
- 6 Airbus A319s.
- 22 Airbus A320s.
- 136 Airbus A321s.
- 21 Airbus A330-200s.
- 34 Airbus A350s.
- 80 Boeing 737s.
- 47 Boeing 777s.
- 26 Boeing 787s.
In total, they have 409 aircraft in their fleet, of which 378 are in active service, and 31 are parked, with an average fleet age of 9.7 years.
Turkish Airlines flight TK726, which was involved in the fire, departed from Istanbul at 2129 local time on May 10 and headed east towards Kathmandu.
Everything was normal in the flight until the landing segment.
As per The Aviation Herald, it is understood that the aircraft rolled out after landing and started to turn off the high-speed exit of the runway, when smoke was seen from the landing gear.
Following the reports of smoke, the aircraft then came to an abrupt stop and the emergency slides were evacuated on the runway.
It is understood that two people were injured following the evacuation.
Aftermath Following The Fire…
Video footage and imagery have swirled over social media showing the smoke and fire coming from the Turkish Airlines Airbus A330 at Kathmandu.
Turkish Airlines’ Senior Vice President of Communications said the following on the incident:
“Initial assessments indicate that the smoke was caused by a technical malfunction in a hydraulic pipe”.
As a result of this accident, the return TK727 rotation was cancelled.
With the aircraft being 30% clear of the runway, this resulted in operations being disrupted whilst the smoke was addressed and then the aircraft moved.
As soon as we have more information pertinent to the incident at hand, then we will update you accordingly.
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