Jetstar Charter Turns Back to Solomon with FIFO Miners

4th Jun 2015

A Jetstar charter plane with 87 workers from the Solomon hub had to make a landing near Tom Price in the Pilbara region some 15-20 minutes after it took off on Tuesday, 2nd June

The reason for this, it was revealed, was because the crew started noticing a strange smell emanating from the back of the cabin.

A spokesman for the Australian airline said the pilot had to turn back about 15 minutes after take-off.

He said:

"The captain operating the flight elected to return to Solomon after being notified by cabin crew of an unusual smell in the rear of the cabin. The flight landed safely at Solomon Airport without incident."

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau also confirmed that the pilot on the Tuesday morning Jetstar flight was forced to take an emergency landing about 20 minutes after the aircraft took off.

Once the plane landed at Solomon Airport without any problems, Jestar's engineers promptly inspected the aircraft in order to determine the cause of the smell.

Unfortunately, the carrier didn't reveal the source of the odor by the time this article was finished.

Meanwhile, the 87 passengers did not have to wait for another vessel for very long. A Qantas plane operating between Cloudbreak and Perth stopped in Solomon and collected most of the passengers soon afterwards.

Another plane was also sent to pick up the few passengers who remained behind in Solomon and they arrived in Perth last evening.

The Solomon mine is operated by the Fortescue Metals Group. A spokesman for FMG explained that all their passengers had been previously examined by an emergency services team, and that they were cleared to board the plane back to Perth.

Solomon hub consists of two mines, FIretail and Kings, which were opened in 2012 and 2014, respectively. Both mines extract iron ore.