Saudia Airbus A330-200 makes emergency landing at Jeddah airport

Saudi Arabian Airlines flight SV3818, which was travelling from Madinah to Dhaka, had to be diverted to Jeddah after suffering a malfunction with the nose landing gear.

Saudia Airbus A330-200 — leased from Onur Air (reg. TC-OCH) — made an emergency landing at Jeddah’s King Abdulaziz International Airport with the nose gear retracted.

The aircraft had circled Jeddah for several hours and was forced to make two low passes until it was allowed to land on runway 34R at around 22:00 local time.

Saudia Airbus A330-200 leased from Onur Air (TC-OCH) made an emergency landing at Jeddah Airport without its nosegear resulting in damage when nose sank to the ground. Flight #SV3818 made emergency evacuation via slides on the runway. https://t.co/1jmQ6Endfi pic.twitter.com/3wCtM3Dyck

— JACDEC (@JacdecNew) May 21, 2018

The Airbus 330 suffered considerable damage, but passengers were evacuated via emergency slides and no injuries have been reported so far.

Abdurahman Al-Tayyib, spokesman of Saudia, said that SV3818 flight, which was traveling from Madinah to Dhaka, developed some malfunction of the hydraulic system at around 8 p.m. Monday and was therefore diverted to Jeddah airport, Al-Madinah daily reported.

“The pilot made several attempts but failed to correct the malfunction with the front landing gear. Subsequently, the Air Bus 330 made an emergency landing with the nose gear retracted,” he said.

Al-Tayyib said that the flight made emergency evacuation. There were 141 passengers on board in addition to 10 crew members. The concerned authorities have started a probe into the accident, he said.

According to Sabq, health services department at the airport formed a medical team to treat the injured passengers following the emergency landing of the flight.