NIGHTMARE

Passengers Stranded for Hours After Plane Skids Off Runway

“We didn’t know if [it] was going to blow up,” one passenger said.

An Air Canada plane veered off the runway Thursday after landing at Montréal-Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport, leaving passengers stuck on board for three hours before they were allowed to get off. The Boeing 737 MAX was carrying 156 passengers and six crew members on a flight from Los Angeles International Airport to Montreal. The plane landed normally before “leaving the taxiway after landing,” according to a post on X. Air Canada said the aircraft had “traveled through the grass when exiting the main runway.” No injuries were reported, but passengers were reportedly left waiting aboard the aircraft as they tried to determine what had happened and when they would be allowed to disembark. “We were going very fast, and suddenly there was a big smoke smell and the next thing I knew, we were tumbling on the grass,” passenger Edelston Peterson told CBC. “We didn’t know if [it] was going to blow up,” she added. The runway was temporarily closed following the incident, with CBC reporting that some flights experienced delays but none were canceled. The Daily Beast has reached out to Air Canada for further comment.