Crossair plane skids off runway at Zurich airport

A Crossair Jumbolino plane skidded off the runway at Zurich airport Keystone

A Crossair plane arriving from Düsseldorf in Germany skidded off the runway at Zurich airport on Thursday after landing.

All 32 passengers and seven crew members were unharmed. However, they were told to leave the plane immediately, once it had come to a standstill on a grassy area, next to the runway.

The Jumbolino plane veered to the right off the runway while travelling at a speed of around 70 kilometres an hour.

The incident comes just six month after 10 people were killed in a crash involving a Crossair plane, minutes after it took off from Zurich airport on its voyage to the German city of Dresden.

Referring to Thursday’s incident, a spokesman for the Crossair parent company, SAirGroup, said that the passengers and crewmembers were picked up by buses and taken into care by a specialist team.

According to the spokesman, one of the aircraft’s four tyres had deflated. He said, “We don’t yet know whether this was the cause for what happened or simply a consequence.”

The Swiss Aviation Authority has launched an inquiry into the matter.

Air traffic in and out of Zurich airport was stopped temporarily in the wake of the incident, since the Crossair aircraft was blocking the runway.

The SAirGroup also revealed that another Crossair plane ran into difficulties on Thursday when it was forced to land in Basel. The Saab 2000 bound from Zurich to the Italian airport of Genoa failed to pull its undercarriage up, shortly after the incident at Zurich airport.

The plane was diverted to Basel airport as the runway at Zurich was still closed. All 37 passengers and four crew members were unharmed on arriving safely in Basel.

Only a month ago, an independent study gave Crossair the all clear for its safety standards but also pointed out that it was badly organised.

swissinfo with agencies.