One of US express carrier FedEx’s Boeing 767-300ER freighters has been involved in a landing incident at Istanbul after its nose-gear failed to deploy.
The aircraft was operating flight FX6238 from Paris Charles de Gaulle on May 8.
Istanbul airport’s operator said that the twinjet experienced a “technical issue” which resulted in the nose-gear remaining retracted.
But the aircraft touched down safely on runway 16R at about 08:17, having made two previous missed approaches.
In a post on X (below), Turkey’s minister of transport and infrastructure, Abdulkadir Uraloğlu, said: “This morning, we professionally evacuated the pilots and cabin crew of the cargo plane, whose front landing gear was not deployed at Istanbul Airport, and which landed smoothly on the fuselage thanks to the successful guidance of our teams.”
“Immediately after the controlled landing upon the fuselage, the [situation] was brought under control by Istanbul airport rescue and firefighting teams, without any injuries or loss of life,” the airport operator IGA added.
Personnel worked to remove the 767 from the closed runway and restore routine flight operations. Air traffic was unaffected, IGA added.
“After the pilot reported that the forward landing-gear was not deployed, he was immediately contacted by the tower,” said Uraloglu.
He said that, after the nose-gear was confirmed not to have deployed, the airport’s authorities readied emergency response and medical teams.
Both pilots evacuated the aircraft and neither was injured, he stated. The runway was temporarily closed.
“Our necessary technical investigations continue,” says Uraloglu.
Preliminary information from the scene indicates the aircraft involved is N110FE, a General Electric CF6-powered jet delivered new to FedEx in 2014.
