Japan Plane Collision: Passengers Recount Horrifying Experiences, Say Smoke in Cabin 'Stung Like Hell'

In the shocking incident from Tuesday, where at least five people died after a Japan Airlines aircraft, carrying 367 passengers, caught fire at Tokyo’s Haneda Airport, one of the passengers, recounted his horrifying experience.

A 17-year old passenger, Swede Anton Deibe who was on board the Japanese Airlines flight which caught on fire was travelling with his parents and sister and was among the 379 people who managed to escape without any harm due to the crash.

In a conversation with Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet, Deibe said, “The entire cabin was filled with smoke within a few minutes. We threw ourselves down on the floor. Then the emergency doors were opened and we threw ourselves at them.”

The television footage captured flames emanating out of windows and the plane’s nose on the ground as rescue workers sprayed it and burning debris was spotted on the runway. Over 70 fire engines have been deployed to bring the fire under control.

The 17-year-old further said that the smoke inside the cabin “stung like hell” and people had no idea where they were going. Unable to understand anything, they just ran out onto the field after the flight landed.

“It was chaos,” said Deibe.

Describing the aircraft collision, another passenger told Kyodo news agency, “I felt a boom like we had hit something and jerked upward the moment we landed.” The passenger further said that there were sparks outside the window as the cabin got filled with gas and smoke.

Kaoru Ishii, a mother who was waiting for her 29-year-old daughter and boyfriend to come back on the flight, said that she initially thought the flight was delayed until her daughter called to explain. “She said the plane had caught fire, and she exited via a slide,” said Ishii as quoted by India Today.

All 367 passengers were successfully evacuated from the blazing plane, Japanese broadcaster NHK said. The broadcaster said the captain of the coast guard plane survived but five crew members remain unaccounted for.

NHK citing Japan Airlines said the plane that caught fire was Flight 516 which flew in from New Chitose Airport in Hokkaido to Tokyo’s Haneda Airport.

Haneda is one of the busiest airports of the world and the nation, according to AFP has not suffered a serious commercial aviation accident in decades.