A FedEx cargo plane made an emergency landing at New Jersey's Newark Liberty International Airport on Saturday after a bird strike caused an engine fire. The flames were visible on the plane's wing in the morning sky, reports said.
There were no reported injuries, and the fire on the Boeing 767 cargo plane was contained to the engine. Audio recorded by LiveATC captured a person calmly saying the aircraft needed to “shut down for a possible bird strike” immediately. “We need to return to the airport.” The audio indicates the strike happened when the plane was several hundred feet off the ground.
A spokesperson for FedEx reportedly told the Associated Press that the plane was headed for Indianapolis and suffered engine damage in the bird strike.
Kenneth Hoffman, a pilot on another flight, said as his flight was pushing off, they heard from air traffic control that there was an emergency in progress. Hoffman posted a video on social media of a FedEx plane on the ground at the Newark airport with flames shooting from its side as it slowed to a stop with fire rescue equipment nearby.
The Federal Aviation Administration said it will investigate the incident.
The emergency landing comes at a time of heightened awareness of flight problems. In the past month, there have been four major aviation disasters in North America. They include the Feb. 6 crash of a commuter plane in Alaska that killed all 10 people on board and the Jan. 26 midair collision between an Army helicopter and an American Airlines flight at National Airport that killed all 67 aboard the two aircraft.