False fire alarm: Air China flight makes emergency landing in Russia
- Passengers evacuated into freezing temperatures in remote subarctic region
- Checks show faulty fire alarm likely to blame
An Air China flight carrying 188 passengers from Beijing to Los Angeles made an emergency landing in a remote part of far eastern Russia on Tuesday morning.
All passengers and crew of CA983 were evacuated safely by inflatable slides at Anadyr airport which serves Russia’s easternmost town in the subarctic district of Chukotka.
A video of the evacuation scene circulating on Weibo, China’s version of Twitter, showed passengers walking from the plane in freezing temperatures of around -10 degrees Celsius (14 degrees Fahrenheit), while the slides waved violently in the strong wind.
The aircraft took off from Beijing at 9.13pm on Monday and landed at Anadyr at 2.55am. Passengers were transferred to the terminal while they waited for another plane to fly them to their destination.
The emergency landing was triggered by a fire alarm that went off in the aircraft’s cargo compartment as it was flying above Russia, Air China said in an apology on Weibo on Tuesday.
A check of the Boeing 777 suggested a malfunction in the alarm system as no sign of fire could be found, the company said.
“Examinations after landing showed the cargo compartment was in normal condition and there was no sign of fire. We therefore came to an initial conclusion that the alarm was triggered due to malfunction,” it said.
In July last year, an Air China plane flying from Hong Kong to the northeastern Chinese city of Dalian abruptly lost altitude because a co-pilot was smoking an electronic cigarette in the cockpit.
An investigation later found that the plane, which landed safely in Dalian with a delay of more than an hour, lost oxygen when the co-pilot hit the wrong button when trying to get rid of the smell, accidentally triggering a depressurisation alert. His licence was revoked.