Dozens of people were sickened when smoke entered the cabin of an ArkeFly flight en-route to the Spanish island of Lanzarote, part of the Canary Islands.
An ArkeFly 737-800 (PH-TFA) gets a pull from a tug at AMS. (Photo by Barcex, CC-BY-SA-2.5)
The plane was about twenty minutes into the flight on Thursday after leaving Amsterdam Schiphol Airport in the Netherlands when smoke entered the cabin, causing some of the passengers to feel sick. The plane returned to Schiphol Airport and landed safely at around 6.04 p.m. local time.
A total of 178 passengers and six crew members were aboard the aircraft, a Boeing 737-800, when the incident happened. The plane was en-route to the Spanish island of Lanzarote.
ArkeFly said a mistake during the de-icing process before take-off might have been the cause of the incident. “Technicians of ArkeFly suspect that liquid to keep the plane free of ice may have ended up in the inlet of the air conditioning system,” a statement from the airline said.
In all, 30 people complained of feeling ill as a result of the smoke, but none of them had to be taken to a hospital.
On Friday, however, the same aircraft involved in Thursday’s incident again had smoke problems during a flight to the Egyptian city of Hurghada. The cause was not immediately known, and it was not clear if it was related to Thursday’s incident.
