The emergency evacuation took place overnight at Hong Kong International Airport. Already on the runway, moments before the decision point, the pilots of Cathay Pacific Flight CX880 bound for Los Angeles noticed a technical problem. 13 year old Boeing interrupted the run and returned to the terminal building.
Two injured passengers remain in the hospital, nine have been discharged, most of the passengers have already flown to Los Angeles on a new aircraft.
The evacuation video shows passengers, randomly leaving the plane with their hand luggage. Some chose to stay inside the plane.
Cathay Pacific confirmed that there were 293 passengers and 17 crew members on board. Of these, 283 flew to Los Angeles on the next flight.
The troubled Boeing was supposed to take off from Hong Kong just after midnight on Saturday, but returned to the gate after the takeoff had to be aborted. Due to sudden braking, overheating and fire occurred in the landing gear area.
After the aircraft returned to the parking lot, the crew initiated the evacuation of passengers, and activated evacuation slides on five doors.
Crew members were suspended from flights after the incident, which is standard practice for incidents of this nature.
There is a high risk of injury during emergency evacuation using crash slides, which is why some airlines and aviation regulators recommend using them only in the most serious incidents, and not as a precautionary measure.
In this case, since the plane had already returned to the air bridge, the pilots apparently chose not the best option, preferring an emergency evacuation to a prompt regular disembarkation of passengers.
Quick disembarkation involves exiting passengers via the boarding bridge as quickly as possible and without carry-on baggage. The chance of injury is minimal, although it is clearly a slower process than using a rescue slide.
Investigators will obviously consider whether an emergency evacuation was necessary and then try to determine how effectively the crew managed process. It also remains unclear how passengers were allowed to take backpacks and suitcases on wheels from the shelves.