Airplane Door Falls On Supermarket

While we were waiting for our next part of our flight back to Palmas, we heard about the following news story. When I was entering the plane the pilot was there so I said to him, this isn't the plane that the door falls off of is it? And he replied no this the plane that's not working. (He was referring to the one hour delay for mechanical problems) Yikes!?! What a way to start off our flights in Brazil.


Jet lands safely after door falls off
From Australian Breaking News.
August 09, 2006
A JET owned by leading Brazilian airline TAM landed safely today after one of its doors fell off and crashed to earth next to a supermarket shortly after departure from Sao Paulo.

No one was hurt in the incident, a TAM spokeswoman said.

The Fokker 100 plane with 79 people aboard on route to Rio de Janeiro returned to the airport safely 18 minutes after taking off.

TAM has been replacing its Fokker planes since the Dutch aircraft maker went bankrupt 10 years ago. It still has 22, but expects to gradually eliminate all of them by 2010.

The same type of plane, also operated by TAM, caused one of Brazil's worst air disasters in 1996. It crashed in an urban area shortly after taking off from Sao Paulo, killing about 100 people, including some on the ground.

In 1997, an explosion of undetermined origin killed a passenger who was blown out of a TAM Fokker 100 during flight.

In 2001, an engine breakup on a TAM Fokker 100 caused two cabin windows to shatter and one of 82 passengers aboard died as a result of the depressurisation.