Over 160 people onboard an IndiGo flight from Delhi had a narrow escape today when one of the tyres of the aircraft burst while landing at the airport in Srinagar.
"The tyre of the flight coming from Delhi burst during landing at around 1.10am," airport director Mohammad Israr said.
All 158 passengers and six crew members are safe, the airline said.
Israr said the tyre had been replaced and the IndiGo flight 6E-551 was ready for take off.
The Airbus A-320 was operating on the Bangalore-Delhi-Srinagar- Jammu sector and the incident happened soon after it landed at Srinagar airport, airport sources said in Srinagar.
An airline spokesperson said that a tyre was found damaged during routine inspection by aircraft engineers and had to be changed.
"The IndiGo team had carried out necessary inspection, and changed the tyre to ensure we meet all safety standards. Owing to this development, there has been a delay in the flight take-off from Srinagar," the spokesperson said.
The incidents adds to a string of close calls for various flights. On June 16, an Air India plane from Mumbai to Delhi with 140 passengers and six crew members had a close shave when it suffered a bird hit while landing at the city airport here, a day after two tyres of the same aircraft were found deflated on landing at Delhi.
Earlier this month, an Air India Express Dubai-Pune flight with 112 passengers on board, dropped several thousand feet over Muscat air space after hitting an air pocket, giving anxious moments to those on board.
About a week later, a mid-air collision was averted by pilots as a Jet Airways and an Air India plane came 'dangerously close' on the same flight path over Tamil Nadu.
Air India flight IC 671 and Jet Airways flight 9W 4758, carrying nearly 250 passengers and crew, came close to colliding with each other at a height of 17,000 feet near Tiruchchirappalli air space, triggering an Air Traffic Collision Avoidance siren in both the planes.
On June 3, a possible disaster was averted at Mumbai's Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport when a flight was cleared for landing while another plane was waiting for take-off on the same runway.
A Chennai-bound Spicejet flight with 201 passengers was cleared for take-off shortly after 1.30am but the flight commander detected some technical problem and informed the air traffic control (ATC).
At the same time, the ATC had already cleared for landing a Kingfisher Airlines flight arriving from New Delhi. The Kingfisher flight too had some 200 passengers on board.
On May 22, an Air India Express aircraft had overshot the runway at Mangalore airport and crashed into a ravine killing 158 passengers, the worst air disaster in a decade.
