All 165 passengers escape plane fire

August 20, 2007

The Boeing 737-800 plane, which had just arrived from Taipei, was already being evacuated when the left engine exploded, ripping the plane apart, officials and witnesses said. The charred remains of the plane lay broken on the tarmac near the terminal after the flames were extinguished, an hour after the explosion. China Airlines has a troubled safety record with four deadly accidents in the past 13 years, including a crash in the Japanese city of Nagoya in 1994 in which 264 people were killed.