An aircraft mishap was averted during the early hours of Monday when Flyscoot pilots noticed smoke emanating from their flight’s cockpit while on air. Flyscoot, a Singaporean budget airline owned by Singapore Airlines, operates aircraft from Singapore to China and India.
Flight SCO 567 carrying 170 passengers had its scheduled departure from Trichy Airport in Tamil Nadu at 1.30 am on Monday, and was on its way to Singapore. The flight was expected to land at 8.30 am in Singapore. However, just a few hours into its journey, pilots on the aircraft noticed smoke from the flight’s cockpit area. Immediately they checked for grounding in Chennai International Airport, following which the aircraft landed in the airport’s cargo area.
An employee with the airline confirmed the news to TNM. “The flight has made an emergency landing in Chennai. We do not have further information from the ground and alternate arrangements will be made for the passengers,” they said.
A team of 60 firefighters were ready on the ground when the flight landed in Chennai at 3.50 am. No major mishap occurred while landing and the passengers were ushered into safety by 4.50 am. A source from the airport has informed TNM that the passengers have been lodged at a hotel and an alternate aircraft will be arranged for their travel to Singapore.
Scoot currently flies to eight cities in the country – Amritsar, Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad, Kochi, Lucknow, Tiruchirappalli and Thiruvananthapuram. Its daily non-stop flight services to Thiruvananthapuram from Singapore was recently initiated and it was also announced that the airline intends to withdraw operations from Lucknow from next month owing to weak demand on the route. While it currently operates three flights a week from Lucknow, operations will be suspended after June 29.
The airline also plans to start operations from Coimbatore and Visakhapatnam in the country.
Other destinations outside India where Scoot suspended its functions due to weak demands are the main airport to Philippine resort island Boracay; Quanzhou in China’s Fujian province and Male, the capital of Maldives.
Source: The News Minute