Alaska Airlines Passengers Flight Evacuate Boeing 737 at Sea-Tac

Passengers aboard an Alaska Airlines flight from Sea-Tac to Anchorage Sunday were evacuated after smoke and a brief flash of flame occurred on a Boeing 737 as it sat at a gate.

Alaska Airlines spokesperson Bobbi Egan said 144 passengers and crew of seven were on the 737 at gate N7 when residual fuel in an engine of the auxiliary power unit caused brief flame and smoke.

Egan said the APU, which is attached to the rear of the aircraft, provides power to the aircraft when it’s at the gate.

The passengers were evacuated and boarded another plane to Anchorage.

Henan Air Cancels All Flights After Crash in China

Henan Airlines, controlled by Air China Ltd., canceled all flights today after one of its aircraft crashed, killing at least 42 people in China’s first fatal commercial-plane accident in almost six years.

The move was reported by state-run Xinhua News Agency and confirmed by a Henan Air official, who declined to give her name when telephoned by Bloomberg News today. Neither said how long the suspension would last.

A Henan Air Embraer 190, carrying 96 people, broke in two and caught fire after overshooting the runway in the northeastern province of Heilongjiang at 9:36 p.m. yesterday, according to Xinhua. China last had a fatal commercial crash in 2004, as improving safety standards and the acquisition of modern planes helps the aviation industry cope with a threefold jump in passenger numbers over the past nine years.

“The safety record at most big Chinese airlines has been improving,” said Bai Bingyang, a Shanghai-based analyst at Capital Securities Corp. “Still, this will bring flight safety back into the limelight and may spur tougher inspections.”

Investigators have found the black box from the aircraft, according to Xinhua. The plane’s captain was among the 54 people who survived the crash, the news agency said. All survivors were injured, including seven in a severe condition, it said.

Vice Minister Sun Baoshu of the Human Resources and Social Security Ministry, was who onboard the plane, is in a critical state, the news agency said. The aircraft was also carrying 17 members of staff from the ministry, it reported, without saying how many in the group were killed.

First E-Jet Crash

Planemaker Empresa Brasileira de Aeronautica SA has sent a team to help with the investigation, it said in a statement. The crash is the first fatal accident involving the Brazilian company’s E-Jet family of regional aircraft, according to a Flight Safety Foundation Website.

Henan Air had a fleet of five E-190s as of last month and it has ordered 50 ARJ-21 regional jets from Commercial Aircraft Corp. of China, according to Flight International’s World Airliner Census.

Tracy Chen, a spokeswoman for Embraer in Beijing and Huang Bin, a spokesman for Air China, declined to comment on the crash. Air China gained a controlling stake in Henan Air’s parent, Shenzhen Airlines, earlier this year.

Air China, the world’s largest airline by market value, fell 2.2 percent to 11.39 yuan in Shanghai trading today. In Hong Kong, the carrier dropped 2.8 percent to HK$8.44 as of 3:13 p.m. Embraer slid 3.9 percent to 10.42 reais yesterday in Sao Paulo.

Forested Valley

The 40-minute flight departed from the city of Harbin at 8:51 p.m. local time for Yichun city’s Lindu Airport, the General Administration of Civil Aviation of China said. The airport, in a forested valley about 9 kilometers (5.6 miles) from downtown Yichun, has been shut, the regulator said.

State broadcaster China Central Television’s news channel read out the names and the national identification card numbers of passengers killed in the crash during a broadcast today. Vice Premier Zhang Dejiang traveled to the crash site late yesterday, Xinhua reported.

The first E-190, which seats as many as 114 passengers, was delivered to JetBlue Airways Corp. in 2005, according to Embraer’s website. There are about 600 E-Jet family planes in operation, spread across 46 carriers in 30 countries, it said.

The Henan Air accident is China’s worst air disaster since a Bombardier Inc. CRJ-200 plane operated by China Eastern Airlines Corp. crashed into a frozen lake in Inner Mongolia shortly after takeoff in November 2004, killing 53 people onboard.

China airline passenger numbers rose 20 percent last year to 230 million, Xinhua said in January. That compares with 67.2 million in 2000. In the first seven months of this year, the number of travelers rose 18 percent to 151.8 million.

Major Air Crashes on Chinese Record since 1980

The crash of a passenger aircraft in northeast China’s Heilongjiang Province Tuesday ended an unbroken record of civil air safety stretching back almost six years.

The following are major air crashes on the Chinese mainland since 1980:

August 24, 2010: A ERJ-190 jet manufactured by Brazilian aerospace conglomerate Embraer crashes near the runway of Lindu airport, Yichun, Heilongjiang Province at 9:36 p.m., killing 42 people and injuring 54.

November 21, 2004: A Bombardier CRJ200 passenger jet crashes in Baotou City, northern Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, killing all 53 on board and two on the ground.

May 7, 2002: A McDonnell Douglas MD-82 operated by China Northern Airlines crashes off the coast of the northeastern Dalian City, killing all 112 aboard.

June 22, 2000: A Yun-7 passenger aircraft crashes on the outskirts of the central Wuhan City, killing 44 on board and seven on a ship.

February 24, 1999: All 61 people on board are killed when a China Southwest Airlines Tupolev-154-2622 jet crashes en route from Chengdu, capital of the southwestern Sichuan Province, to Wenzhou City, Zhejiang Province.

May 8, 1997: A China Southern Airlines Boeing 737-300 crashes on landing at an airport in the southern Shenzhen City, killing 35 of the 74 passegers and crew.

June 6, 1994: A China Northwest Airlines Tupolev-154 crashes in Mingdu Township in northwest China’s Shaanxi Province, killing all 160 people on board.

July 23, 1993: A China Northwest Airlines BAe146 crashes into a pond while taking off from an airport in northwestern Yinchuan City, killing 55 people.

November 24, 1992: A total of 141 people are killed when a Boeing 737 passenger aircraft operated by China Southern Airlines crashes in mountains in Yangshuo County in southern Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.

July 31, 1992: A China General Airlines passenger aircraft crashes off the runway when taking off in Nanjing, killing 107 people and injuring 19.

October 2, 1990: A hijacked Boeing 737 plane belonging to Xiamen Airlines collides with a China Southern Airlines B757 passenger jet at Baiyun Airport in the southern Guangzhou City, killing 82 on the Boeing 737 and 46 on the Boeing 757.

August 15, 1989: A China Eastern Airlines An-24 on a flight from Shanghai to Nanchang crashes during taking-off because of engine failure, killing 34 people.

January 18, 1988: A total of 108 people on board are killed when an IL-14P aircraft operated by China Southwest Airlines crashes near an airport in the southwestern Chongqing city.

January 18, 1985: A CAAC An-24 on a flight from Nanjing to Jinan crashes in Jinan, capital of the eastern Shandong Province, killing 38 people.

December 24, 1982: An IL-18B aircraft on a flight from Changsha to Guangzhou crashes at Baiyun Airport in Guangzhou, killing 25 passengers.

April 26, 1982: A CAAC Trident2E passenger aircraft en route from Guangzhou to Guilin in Guangxi crashes in Gongcheng County, Guangxi, killing all 112 people on board.

China Plane Crash Highlights New Risks for China’s Booming Air Travel Industry

Tuesday night’s deadly China plane crash highlights the risks in China’s booming air travel industry. A disproportionate number of flights now have to take off and land at night without proper lighting.

The plane crash in China that killed 42 people late Tuesday night was a rare blot on the country’s aviation safety copybook, say experts here. But it highlights the risks of flying in and out of some small regional airports at night, something more airlines are forced to do to meet the demands of China’s booming travel industry.

A domestic Henan Airways passenger jet crashed and burst into flames at a fog-shrouded provincial airport near Yichun in northeastern China, killing 42 and injuring 54, according to official reports.

It is still not known what caused the accident “but from news reports I deduce that the reason is human error,” says Wang Yanan, deputy editor of Aerospace Knowledge magazine. “I think it came down too fast or too steeply.”

It emerged Wednesday that another airline, China Southern, decided last August to avoid night flights into Yichun. A technical note on the airline’s website said that “in principle there should be no night flights at Yichun airport,” citing worries about landing-strip lighting, weather conditions, and the surrounding hilly terrain.

The newly built airport, one of a number of such regional facilities springing up all over the country to serve China’s booming travel industry, sits in a forested valley. China will have 244 airports by 2020, up from about 175 today, according to figures from the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC.)

“Over the last few years, because of the high demand and big market, regional aviation has developed very fast,” says Mr. Wang. “The quality of personnel and facilities may not be keeping up.”

Tuesday’s crash, however, was the first major commercial airline accident in China for nearly six years, Wang points out. “I think it is an isolated case,” he adds. “In general aviation safety in China is normal.”

The government credits this to a nationwide crackdown on safety that it ordered in 2004, upgrading aircraft and airports, after 10 serious airplane crashes in four years had given China a notoriously dangerous reputation.

But at new airports a disproportionate number of flights take off and land at night, because airlines serving them can no longer get daytime slots at the busy hubs they fly to and from.

“At night in northern China it is often cold and wet, so it may be foggy,” Wang points out, suggesting that Yichun airport’s landing lights may have been too weak to see properly in Tuesday night’s fog. “Small airports should install the right sort of equipment to cope with different conditions,” he adds.