Plane carrying 230 passengers crash lands in Warsaw Published duration 1 November 2011

media caption Emergency crews waited on the runway as the plane made its landing

A Boeing 767 carrying 231 people has made an emergency landing at Warsaw airport after its landing gear failed.

The plane, which was travelling from the US city of Newark, in New Jersey, landed on its belly without its wheels.

It had circled above the Polish city for over an hour burning up fuel as the airport was prepared for the crash landing.

The Polish airline Lot, which operated the flight, said all safety procedures had worked and that no-one was injured.

"The plane landed safely on its belly on the runway which had been sprayed with special flame-retardant substances. All the passengers disembarked, no-one was injured," Leszek Chorzewski, a spokesman for Lot, told AFP news agency.

In preparation for the landing, the airport was closed to all other flights, while nearby streets were cleared, reports Reuters news agency. Two military F-16 jets were scrambled to observe its progress.

The BBC's Adam Easton in Warsaw says the emergency landing looked incredibly smooth to the untrained eye as the plane slid to a halt on the runway, giving off relatively few sparks.

After it landed, fire crews could be seen hosing the aircraft with water and foam as a precaution.