“IT WAS A MIRACLE”
Footage and images shared on social media showed passengers shouting inside the smoke-filled cabin and running across the tarmac away from an evacuation slide.
Video also showed passengers being evacuated calmly via escape slides, apparently without hand luggage.
“The cabin crew must have done an excellent job. There don’t seem to be any carry-ons. It was a miracle that all the passengers got off,” said Paul Hayes, director of air safety at UK-based aviation consultancy Ascend by Cirium.
Aviation safety agencies have warned for years that pausing to collect carry-on baggage during an evacuation risks lives.
Kaoru Ishii, a mother who was waiting outside the arrival gate for her 29-year-old daughter and boyfriend coming back on the flight said she initially though the flight was delayed until her daughter called to explain.
“She said the plane had caught fire and she exited via a slide,” Ishii said. “I was really relieved that she was alright.”
A spokesperson at Japan Airlines said its aircraft had departed from New Chitose airport on the northern island of Hokkaido.