Air India Express Plane Suffers Nose-wheel Problem at Phuket Airport
Authorities suspended flight operations at Phuket airport following the incident since the aircraft is stuck on the runway, sources said.
Mumbai: An Air India Express aircraft operating its Hyderabad-Phuket (Thailand) flight suffered a nose-wheel issue at Phuket Airport, after it made a hard landing, damaging its landing gear and disrupting arriving flights, the airline said on Wednesday.
Phuket International Airport issued a Notice to Airmen (NOTAM) from 12.08 pm to 6 pm, temporarily closing the runway. All flights scheduled to land were required to hold in nearby airspace, and some were diverted to alternate airports.
The number of passengers onboard the Boeing 737-Max8 aircraft was not immediately known. "We confirm that our Hyderabad-Phuket flight on March 11 experienced an issue with the nose wheel at Phuket Airport," Air India Express said in a statement.
The nose wheel is a critical component of an aircraft's landing gear system. Flight IX 938 took off from Hyderabad at 6.42 am instead of its scheduled departure time of 6.20 am, and landed at Phuket International Airport at 11.40 am local time, according to flight tracking website flightradar24.com. "The crew followed all standard protocols, and guests were deplaned," Air India Express said in the statement.
