Windshield Blows Out of Chinese Passenger Jet, Co-pilot 'Sucked Halfway' Out

A Sichuan Airlines flight was forced to make an emergency landing on Monday after a cockpit windshield suddenly blew out and the co-pilot was sucked halfway out of the window. Pilot Liu Chuanjian landed the Airbus A319 manually. He told the Chengdu Economic Daily that his aircraft had just reached a cruising altitude of 32,000 feet when a “deafening sound” tour through the cockpit. The right windshield was gone, he said, and the cockpit experienced a sudden loss of pressure and drop in temperature.

“There was no warning sign. Suddenly, the windshield just cracked and made a loud bang. The next thing I know, my co-pilot had been sucked halfway out of the window,” Chuanjian was quoted as saying, according to Reuters. “Everything in the cockpit was floating in the air. Most of the equipment malfunctioned…and I couldn’t hear the radio. The plane was shaking so hard I could not read the gauges.”

The co-pilot survived, thanks to the fact that he was wearing his seatbelt. He suffered scratches and a sprained wrist, Reuters reports, and one other cabin crew member was also injured in the rapid descent. None of the plane’s 119 passengers was injured.