Phuket hard-landing incident ‘affected 18,000 travellers’The damaged nose landing gear of the Air India Express Boeing 737-700 is seen after a hard landing at Phuket International Airport on Wednesday. (Photo: Phuket airport management)PHUKET - A seven-hour runway closure that followed a hard landing incident on Wednesday at Phuket International airport affected dozens of flights and about 18,000 travellers, airport management said. Monchai Tanode, general manager of the airport, said 100 international and domestic flights that were scheduled to transport about 18,000 people had to be either rerouted or delayed after the incident involving an Air India Express Boeing 737-300. The incident occurred just before noon on Wednesday as the Air India Express plane arriving at Phuket from Hyderabad was coming in to land a few minutes ahead of schedule and experienced a landing gear problem. The plane’s nose scraped the runway but none of the 133 passengers and seven crew members on board were hurt.

Source: Bangkok Post March 12, 2026 08:05 UTC