All 309 aboard survive Toronto jet crash

TORONTO - A jetliner carrying 309 passengers and crew members erupted in flames Tuesday after skidding off a runway while landing in a thunderstorm at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport. A government official said it appeared everyone survived, but airport authorities said 24 people suffered minor injuries.

Police said the plane was an Air France A340 from Paris that was trying to land at Canada’s busiest airport when it ran into trouble. There was a storm — with lightning and strong wind gusts — in the area at the time.

Steve Shaw, a vice president of the Greater Toronto Airport Authority, said at a news conference shortly after the accident that 14 passengers were injured but that there were “no known fatalities.”  The injury count was later increased to 24, with some passengers reportedly suffering from smoke inhalation.

Shaw said there were 297 passengers and 12 crew aboard Air France Flight 358.

Police spokeswoman Diane Cossitt said she heard over police scanners that the passengers and crew were evacuated. “That is my understanding from what I’ve heard, but I’ve got no confirmation one way or the other,” she said.

Toronto Fire Services Capt. David Sheen told CNN that he understood some casualties had been taken to hospitals but had no information on their condition.

Survivors rescued
AM 680, an all-news station, reported live from the scene that there were two explosions on the plane. The station quoted a police official on the nearby freeway as saying two groups of passengers had been evacuated from the jet.

Toronto’s William Osler hospital was placed on “code orange” to prepare for injuries, according to MSNBC.

A row of emergency vehicles lined up behind the wreck, and a fire truck sprayed the flames with water. A government transportation highway camera recorded the burning plane, and the footage was broadcast live on television in Canada and the United States.

A portion of the plane’s wing could be seen jutting from the trees as smoke and flames poured from the middle of its broken fuselage. At one point, another huge plume of smoke emerged from the wreckage, but it wasn’t clear whether it was from an explosion.

Shaw said at the news conference that the plane appeared to have overshot the runway by 200 meters, or about 655 feet.

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