“I lost all ability to fly the plane”: Pilot's shock claim after plane drops mid-flight
At least 50 passengers have been injured with a dozen hospitalised after a Boeing 787 Dreamliner suddenly plunged about two hours into the flight from Sydney to Auckland on Monday.
LATAM Airlines said that the plane experienced an unspecified "technical event during the flight which caused a strong movement."
Passengers on board the flight have recalled the terrifying moment the plane took a nose-dive mid-flight.
"The plane dipped so dramatically into a nose dive for a couple of seconds and around 30 people hit the ceiling hard," Daniel, who was travelling from London, told the NZ Herald.
“None of us knew what had happened until after the flight, I was just trying to keep everyone calm. We never heard any announcement from the captain."
He added that passengers were screaming and it was hard to tell whether blood or red wine was splattered through the cabin.
Another passenger, Brian Jokat, told broadcaster RNZ that the incident took place in "split seconds".
"There was no pre-turbulence, we were just sailing smoothly the whole way,” he said.
“I had just dozed off and I luckily had my seatbelt on, and all of a sudden the plane just dropped. It wasn’t one of those things where you hit turbulence and you drop a few times … we just dropped.”
He added that a passenger two seats away from him, who was not wearing his seatbelt, flew up into the ceiling and was suspended mid-air before he fell and broke his ribs.
“I thought I was dreaming,” he said. “I opened my eyes and he was on the roof of the plane on his back, looking down on me. It was like The Exorcist.”
Paramedics and more than 10 emergency vehicles were waiting for passengers when the plane landed in Auckland.
Around 50 patients were treated, with 12 of them hospitalised and one in serious condition.
At least three of those treated were cabin crew.
Jokat told RNZ that after the plane landed, the pilot came to the back and explained what had happened.
"He said to me, ‘I lost my instrumentation briefly and then it just came back all of a sudden,’” Jokat said.
In another interview with Stuff.co.nz, Jokat recalled the pilot also saying: “My gauges just blanked out, I lost all of my ability to fly the plane.”
The airline's final destination was Santiago, Chile, but it was landing at Auckland Airport in accordance with its normal flight path, according to Reuters.
"LATAM regrets the inconvenience and injury this situation may have caused its passengers, and reiterates its commitment to safety as a priority within the framework of its operational standards," the airline said.
Images: Brian Jokat/ News.com.au