Vehicle on Cairo runway forces Emirates airlines to brake hard, damaging tyres
Incident causes eight hour delay while passengers change planes
Dubai: An Emirates airline flight from Cairo to Dubai was delayed by over eight hours on Saturday after the pilot had to abort take-off due to the presence of an unauthorized vehicle on the runway.
Emirates confirmed that the aircraft’s tyres were damaged by unexpected braking while the jet was moving at high speed. The aircraft returned back to the terminal where passengers were asked to disembark.
“Passengers were disembarked and a replacement aircraft was arranged and departed from Cairo at 9pm local time, a delay of over eight hours,” an Emirates spokesperson said.
The airline apologised to passengers for any inconvenience, saying that safety was of utmost importance.
“The authorities are investigating the incident, and we are cooperating fully,” the spokesperson said.
Some passengers on the flight took to social media to voice their complaints, saying that the flight was indeed delayed, but by nine or 10 hours. One passenger, Michael Estafanous, said on Twitter that the flight had an emergency stop after a vehicle pulled in front of the plane as it was in the process of taking off.
“Pretty scary, but worse was the nine-hour wait for another flight with very little information as to what was happening,” he tweeted.
Another Twitter user, Huda Ali, tweeted at Emirates that the carrier had “failed terribly” to manage the incident in Cairo where her son was a passenger and where he was delayed by over 10 hours.