Emergency response tested as plane with five onboard makes emergency landing

The Fire Chief (in blue Jersey) makes his way to the plane that did an emergency landing to meet with police and GCAA personnel on Saturday morning.

Guyana’s emergency readiness and response capabilities were again tested on Saturday morning after a plane with five passengers onboard made an emergency landing on the East Bank Demerara.

The plane is registered to Roraima Airways and carry tail registration number 8-R GRE

The incident took place at mid-morning when the pilot took the plane down in the vicinity of Eccles, East Bank Demerara within the Haags Bosch Sanitary Landfill site at Eccles on the East Bank of Demerara.

The first responders to the downed aircraft was said to be personnel from the Guyana Police Force who quickly removed the passengers away from the aircraft.

The passengers were then picked up by a Guyana Defense Force Chopper which arrived within minutes of the police arrival at the location.

Shortly after, the Guyana Fire Service responded but they had challenges which were out of their control.

Transmission which was received by the Fire Service’s Operations Room suggested that the plane went down inside the LaRepentire Landfill Dumpsite (A condemned sanitary landfill site in Central Georgetown).

According to what was communicated to BIG Smith News Watch, the fire service was already minutes away from the actual crash site along the East Bank already navigating a backed up traffic situation.

The crew were however diverted back to Georgetown after information which they received suggested that the crash was in the opposite direction.

Nevertheless, at the end of it all, the team was able to make it to location of the site but there was no explosion to tend to or fire to be put out.

On the scene, teams from the Guyana Police Force, Guyana Fire Service and the Civil Avaition Authority were present conducting their respective investigations and assessments of the situation on the ground.

The Pilot seems to have craftily landed the plan without causing any major injuries to those on board and also at the same time, preventing the aircraft from disintegration.

When this publication visited the site, it was observed that the aircraft came to rest in a swam padded by thick grassy vegetation which posed no real danger to the craft itself or passengers.

The landfill dumpsite is filled with several heaps of garbage, machinery, trucks and even piles of rocks.

The investigations are ongoing.