HARARE – A Rwandair Canadair plane with 65 passengers and eight crew members blew one of its tyres during an aborted take-off at Robert Gabriel Mugabe International Airport on Monday.
The Bombardier CRJ-900 which was performing flight WB-110 to Cape Town was stranded on the main runaway for three hours, causing major disruption which forced incoming aircraft to divert to Bulawayo and Lusaka in Zambia.
The Airports Company of Zimbabwe (ACZ) said no-one was injured in the incident just after 12.45PM.
Crew abandoned take-off at high speed after one of the left main tyres burst. The aircraft slowed and stopped about 460 meters short of the runway end.
The tyre replaced, the aircraft was moved off the runway after about three hours.
ACZ said in a statement: “The incident was resolved at 3.10PM and the runway was cleared, allowing normal operations to resume. ACZ would like to reaffirm to the public that RG Mugabe International Airport has a state-of-the-art newly rehabilitated runway that meets all international safety standards.”
An Ethiopian Airlines Airbus A350 circled over Harare for over an hour before diverting to Lusaka after finding the runaway unavailable for landing.
