More than 300 passengers were left stranded at a remote airport yesterday when a British Airways 747 made an emergency landing because a swarm of bees had activated the plane's fire alarm.
The captain of the Sydney-to-London flight was forced to make a rapid descent from 30,000ft in less than 13 minutes, fearing there was a fierce blaze in the cargo hold.
But after a terrifying landing in Uralsk, in North-Western Kazakhstan, passengers were told it had been a false alarm but they were now stranded on a small airstrip and unable to take off again.
Flight BA010 had been left unfit to continue because fire extinguishers in the cargo hold were set off when the emergency lights illuminated. The 2,500m Uralsk runway is also unsuitable for large planes.
The cause of the emergency landing, 30 miles short of the Russian border in a mountainous and isolated region, is being investigated but it is believed a consignment of live bees in the cargo hold may have got loose, triggering fire sensors.
Thousands of the insects were on board, being transported to Britain from Australia to help counter a honey shortage in the UK following a series of mild winters. Only groups of 100 passengers at a time were allowed out of the stranded aircraft for fresh air yesterday, as two planes were sent from Heathrow to rescue the 354 passengers and crew.
Uralsk airport official Grigory Zhuk admitted that the incident was a 'major emergency' and that the BA captain had been forced to act quickly.
He said: 'It came down fast, without the time to get to a bigger runway. We have made the passengers as comfortable as possible but our facilities are basic we are a small provincial airport.
'We cannot accommodate everyone outside the plane.' BA spokesman Paul Parry said nobody had been hurt in the descent.
'Flight 010 did have a light come on in the cockpit over Kazakhstan, indicating there might have been a fire in the cargo hold,' he said. 'The captain released the automatic extinguishers in the cargo hold and diverted to Uralsk.
'On landing, they discovered there had been no fire. There was a consignment of bees in the cargo hold and our investigation will seek to establish if there was any connection between them and the light coming on.'
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