NTSB Probes FedEx Incident at Fort Lauderdale Airport
The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating the cause of a landing gear collapse on Oct. 28 that damaged a FedEx Corp. plane landing in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, officials said.
The north runway at Fort-Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport remained closed through Oct. 30 following the incident about 6 p.m. Oct. 28. A south runway allowed the airport to operate, but with some flight delays and cancellations.
FedEx ranks No. 2 on the Transport Topics Top 100 list of the largest U.S. and Canadian for-hire carriers.
The left landing gear on the FedEx MD-10 failed after the aircraft landed, causing the left engine and wing to scrape the runway, NTSB spokesman Peter Knudson said Oct. 30. Fuel leaked and airport ground crews extinguished a fire within minutes, officials said.
Two pilots used a cockpit window to escape the plane and there were no injuries, Knudson said.
NTSB teams were examining information from the aircraft's flight data and voice cockpit recorders and on Sunday were interviewing the plane's crew, he said.
By Oct. 30, investigators had completed their examination of the runway, allowing the damaged aircraft, with its left side off the runway, to be removed. However, airport officials had no estimate of when the runway may be reopened.
Fedex plane fuselage exploding at the airport right in front of my dads gate pic.twitter.com/bQZAev2qFv — Alex Robles (@Alex_Robles44) October 28, 2016
