Colombian jet crash 'miracle' as all but one survive

• Plane carrying 127 people lands short of runway
• Only fatality is passenger who had a heart attack
The wreckage of the Boeing 737 lies on the runway after being struck by lightning as it landed at the San Andres airport. Photograph: Colombian Navy/EPA

A Boeing 737 passenger jet crashed and broke into three pieces upon landing during a storm at a Colombian island yesterday, but the only fatality was a passenger who died from an apparent heart attack.

The plane, carrying 121 passengers and six crew members, was about 80 metres from the San Andres island runway when a suspected lightning strike caused it to land short and slide onto the runway, crumpling the fuselage.


The sole fatality, Amar Fernandez de Barreto, 68, died of a suspected heart attack on the way to hospital.

Dozens more were taken to the hospital for evaluation, with five in serious condition. "It's incredible. For the dimension [of the accident] there should be more," said hospital director, Robert Sanchez.

The plane, owned by private company Aires, left Bogotá shortly after midnight and was descending into San Andres, a Caribbean resort off Nicaragua's coast, at 1.49am when the accident happened.

"It's a miracle," said Orlando Paez, a national police general. "The skill of the pilot kept the plane from sliding off the runway. The engines of the aircraft shut down on impact."

Passengers said that despite a storm all appeared normal as they descended. "The plane was going perfectly, we were practically going to land, everything was under control," Ricardo Ramirez, a civil engineer who was going on holiday, told Caracol Radio.

The plane hit short of the runway and slid on its belly as the fuselage fractured and bits of landing gear and at least one engine were ripped off.

"When we fell, we wound up on the pavement still in the seats," said Ramirez, who struggled to free himself and his wife from their safety belts.

"We tried to get out of the plane because it was starting to shoot flames. In a few minutes, a police patrol arrived and helped us." Survival, said Ramirez, was "a miracle of God".

Another passenger, Heriberto Rua, said he was also on his way to San Andres for a holiday with his wife and five daughters: "I felt an impact. My seat was knocked loose, but I was able to unbuckle myself and get two of my daughters out."

Firefighters doused the beginnings of a fire on a wing, while police officers who were waiting to catch the plane's return leg to Bogotá helped evacuate passengers. In addition to Colombians those aboard included Americans, French, Brazilians, Costa Ricans and Germans. The plane's owner, Aerovias de Integracion Regional SA, said via Twitter that it was working with authorities to confirm the cause of the crash. A police report said a downward draft as the plane descended may have been responsible, but the pilot and island authorities blamed lightning.

CNN's weather centre reported multiple lightning strikes around the airport. Analysis of data from the World Wide Lightning Location Network indicated 11 strikes within 6 miles of the runway in a five-minute span around the crash.


The airport was closed to commercial traffic to allow investigators to inspect the site, but bad weather prevented officials from landing.

Passenger jets are designed to withstand lightning strikes, but they remain vulnerable if struck in certain areas. In recent years lightning has been blamed for plane crashes in China, Cameroon and France.

Against the odds: survival stories

22 May 2010 Eight people, including three infants, survives when an Air India Express 737-800 from Dubai overshot the runway at Mangalore.

12 May 2010 Nine-year-old Dutch boy Ruben van Assouw is sole survivor when 103 people die after an Afriqiyah Airways Airbus A330-200 plunges into the desert near Tripoli airport, Libya.

30 July 2009 A 12-year-old girl is found clinging to the wreckage of an Airbus 310-324 13 hours after it crashed into the sea en route from Sana'a, Yemen, to the Comoros Islands, killing the other 152 passengers and crew.

15 January 2009 "The Miracle on the Hudson" when US Airways flight ditches in the river after taking off from La Guardia airport, New York City. All 155 passengers and crew are rescued from the sinking Airbus 320 which had been disabled by a bird strike.

17 January 2008 BA flight from Beijing to Heathrow lands short of the runway; 136 passengers and 16 crew survive.

14 September 1999 245 passengers and crew on a Britannia Airways flight from Cardiff escape when fuselage of Boeing 757 is ripped apart at Girona, Spain. James Meikle

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