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A week ago on Thursday August 16th a Xiamen Air B737 crash landed at Manila Airport in the Philippines.

A week later the aircraft has been recovered. More is starting to become known about the circumstances regarding the accident. Flight MF8667 slid off of Runway 06/24 at around 11pm. This accident was supposedly due to the rain. The incident meant that Manila International Airport’s runway was closed for almost 36 hours, inconveniencing tens of thousands of passengers. This is unlike the Cathay Pacific B777 that damaged its wing last week causing very little disruption.

Xiamen Response

On Wednesday Xiamen Air released a statement via their twitter account regarding the incident. The airline confirmed that they will cover the cost of removing the aircraft and repairing the runway. The statement went on to cover the aid and assistance that Xiamen had provided to passengers in the aftermath.

The airline confirmed that the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines are investigating the incident with the Civil Aviation Administration of China. While the investigation will still be in its early stages, Xiamen Air stated that they will co-operate fully with the investigation.

$300,000 Handling Charge!

The full figure that Xiamen will be required to pay is far from ready. However, the airport’s general manager, Ed Monreal, gave a preliminary figure. In a statement Mr Monreal said:

“Right now, there are only two aspects that we just had computed. I think [the bill is] in the range of PHP15 million but there is still a lot of cost [to be calculated],”

The two aspects referred to are the immediate repairs required to the runway, in addition to the removal cost of the airplane. It is likely that damages are going to be sought from Xiamen Air if the pilot was a fault. Philippine Senator Grace Poe said “I think that definitely, if they are at fault, they need to be able to compensate for all the losses, specifically financial losses, of about 200 (affected) flights”.

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She went on to add ” it seems now that there might be basis for that”. Poe also said “we cannot also make arbitrary policies, remember that there are also other international airlines that are flying in the country. They would see how we respond to this.” This shows that the Philippines doesn’t want to jump the gun in assigning blame. This is as to not discourage other operators from the country.

This is certainly going to cost a lot for Xiamen Air. However, the majority of the cost will likely be covered by the company’s insurance policy. Exact costs for similar incidences in the past are hard to come by. Partly because of their sensitive nature, but also because it’s difficult to include every single variable. What is almost certain is that like the British Airways B777 that crashed on Heathrow’s runway in 2008, this Boeing 737 will never fly again.