Runaway trailer crashes into parked plane at airport

A Xiamen Airlines plane sustained “minor damage” to its right engine when a runaway ground vehicle crashed into its side while parked overnight.

The incident happened at Hangzhou Xiaoshan International Airport in the Zhejiang Province of China on 26 October at around 2am.

Dramatic CCTV footage captured the moment that two ground workers lost control of a trailer they were towing behind a pickup truck. The trailer came loose and changed path, heading directly towards one of the plane’s engines.

Attempts by staff to prevent a collision by chasing down the runaway trailer failed and the Xiamen Airlines Boeing 737 flight B-1457, idle on the tarmac before its next departure to Xiamen City, was scraped during the crash.

Though the crew who rushed to help made contact with the out of control trailer, no injuries were reported.

The repaired Xiamen Airlines aircraft is now back in service and an investigation into the cause of the mishap is underway.

The Independent has approached Xiamen Airlines for further comment.

It’s not the first time an aircraft has sustained damage while still at the airport.

In January, a JetBlue flight at JFK Airport in New York City bumped into another plane, prompting an investigation by the FAA.

Officials said that Flight 1603 to San Juan, Puerto Rico, was set to take off at 6am, but the aircraft was taken back to the gate and put “out of service” after it struck the tail of another plane operated by the same airline.

The plane “came into light contact with a parked unoccupied aircraft during pushback,” a spokesperson for JetBlue said, according to NBC New York.

“JetBlue Flight 1603 struck the tail of a parked JetBlue aircraft while pushing back from the gate around 7am at John F Kennedy International Airport in New York,” the FAA said. “The flight was going to Luis Muñoz Marin International Airport in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Both aircraft were Airbus 320. No injuries were reported, and the FAA will investigate.”