A plane caught fire at the Fort Lauderdale, Florida airport on Thursday, sending passengers fleeing for their lives out of the aircraft's emergency slides.
Photos and video from the scene show the Dynamic Airways plane engulfed in thick black flames around 12:30pm before airport firefighters came and extinguished the fire with a white foam. The fire has since been completely extinguished and everyone safely taken off the plane.
Broward County fire officials say fifteen people were injured and taken to the hospital, including a child. One person was seriously burned while the rest suffered minor injuries. The uninjured were placed on buses and taken back to a terminal.
'I'm told one of the engines caught fire as the plane was taxiing, getting ready for departure,' airport spokesperson Greg Meyer told WSVN.
A pilot taxiing behind the plane alerted air traffic control that the plane was leaking fuel right before it caught fire.
'There's fuel leaking out of the left engine,' an air traffic controller says. 'Engine's on fire! Engine's on fire!' he says moments later. The plane was on its way to Caracas, Venezuela, and charring on the aircraft suggests the fire started in the left engine.
Local 10 reports that 101 people were on the plane, which can hold up to 250.
Following the fire, the airport temporarily closed but is now open again.
The FAA released a statement saying: 'Dynamic International Airways 405 apparently caught fire on Taxiway B while taxiing for departure from Runway 28 Right at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport, at about 12:45 p.m. An aircraft taxiing behind the Boeing 767 reported that fuel was leaking from the aircraft before the fire started. Passengers evacuated via slides onto the taxiway.'
The National Transportation Safety Board confirmed they are sending a four-person team to investigate the fire.
Dynamic Airways is a small airline founded in 2010. The company is based in Greensboro, North Carolina and connects New York, Fort Lauderdale, Venezuela and Guyana. They just announced their daily flights to Venezuela in June. Thursday's incident appears to be their first accident.
The plane that caught fire on Thursday was built in 1986 and is one of the oldest versions of the 767 model.
Florida is the state with the largest population of Venezuelan ex-patriots.
A similar fire broke out last month at the Las Vegas airport, when a British Airways Boeing 777 plane's left engine became engulfed in flames.
In that case, everyone on board escaped with just a few succumbing minor injuries - mostly for injuries sustained escaping on the plane's slides.
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