Aviation expert discusses plane that caught fire

Multiple people were injured after fire on rumway at Fort Lauderdale airport

The plane was expected to be removed from the runway Thursday night.

News4Jax spoke with an aviation expert, who said the amount of injuries is to be expected in a plane fire like that.

Firefighters were at the scene of the plane fire within two minutes fortunately just in time to rescue everyone on board, many of whom do have some injuries.

The moments were intense as the Boeing 767 in Fort Lauderdale was evacuated as flames poured from the wing following a fuel leak. One person received severe wounds with 17 injured overall.

News4Jax spoke to aviation expert Ed Booth, who said 17 injuries escaping a burning plane is what pilots are trained to expect.

"That is anticipated and expected when you have emergency evacuation of a wide-bodied aircraft, but the alternative is certainly the death of everyone on board when you have an in flight or on the ground fire," Booth said.

A runway at the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport was closed as a result of the fire, which is expected to impact air traffic on the eastern seaboard.

Overall, 219 flights were delayed by the incident and 43 flights were canceled. The Federal Aviation Administration will now begin investigating what happened, which Booth said is most likely due to improper maintenance.

"Possibly improper maintenance, corrosion of fuel lines, something on the engine breaks," Booth said. "But you have an engine consuming approximately a gallon of fuel a second during this mode of taxi, and it doesn't take much for fuel to come out if there's a break in the fuel source."

There were 101 people on board the plane, and the flight's eventual destination was Venezuela. Those passengers will head to their final destinations by Friday.