A Gulf Air Airbus A321neo collided with a FlyDubai Boeing 737-800 at Dubai International Airport on early Thursday morning, July 22nd. The collision took place during taxiing.
The FlyDubai was taxiing to depart DXB bound to Bishkek International Airport, Kyrgyzstan as flight FZ1461, when its wingtip hit the tail of Gulf Air’s Airbus A321neo.
UAE General Civil Aviation Authority confirmed the incident. It released a statement saying: “This morning a minor collision occurred between two planes, one belonging to Fly Dubai and the other to Gulf Air on a runway at Dubai International Airport resulting in minor damage to the tail of one of the two planes and the wing of the other.”
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However, none of the passengers or crew members was injured in the collision, and passengers were accommodated on another flight, as said by FlyDubai spokesperson. The FlyDubai’s passengers departed DXB on a later flight which departed six hours later.
The Bahraini flag carrier also confirmed that the tail of one of its aircraft sustained minor damage. However, the aircraft affected was not announced by the Gulf carrier. An airlines spokesperson said that the airline was working to accommodate all the passengers on another flight. It was scheduled to depart to Bahrain.
flydubai 737 collides with Gulf Air A321 on the ground at Dubai Airport. No injuries reported. https://t.co/OGBRuAxmgn pic.twitter.com/1yrdrh9n9q
— Breaking Aviation News & Videos (@aviationbrk) July 22, 2021
As a result of this collision, one of the runways at DXB was closed for two hours to investigate and manage the collision. However, scheduled operations were not impacted, and the runway was reopened after two hours.
The Gulf Air A321neo involved in the collision is reportedly registered as A9C-NC. This Airbus A321-253NX was delivered to the airline recently in June this year and is currently only two months old. It was assembled in Hamburg.