Smoke reportedly coming from a laptop inside a passenger's bag triggered the evacuation of an American Airlines plane at San Francisco International Airport Friday afternoon, according to officials.
Passengers were boarding American Airlines Flight 2045 to Miami around midday when the smoke started to fill the cabin. Crew members removed the smoking laptop and bag while passengers evacuated, the airline said.
Passenger Carlos Leyva said he had just boarded when his attention turned toward the back of the plane.
"At which point some of us kind of looked toward the back and people just started panicking and running toward the exits," he said. "Most of the people tried to run toward the same way we entered, which was through the front of the plane. At which point everyone just started pushing each other."
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Some passengers used the emergency slides to evacuate the plane, the airline said. Others got off using the jet bridge.
"Some people started to grab their bags, which is not the right thing to do," Leyva said. "At that point I grabbed my wife. We started heading toward the exit the same way we entered. Some people went for the emergency exits and they pulled the exits and there goes the slides."
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The airline said one passenger suffered minor injuries while exiting the plane. The airport said three people suffered minor injuries during the evacuation, adding that none of them needed to be taken to the hospital.
"We thank our crew members for their professionalism and apologize to our customers for the inconvenience," the airline said in a statement.
According to the Federal Aviation Administration, there have been 30 lithium battery incidents this year.
"It’s really going to become incumbent upon the manufacturer the hardware makers to find a battery that’s not so prone to cause these situations," said Mike McCarron, an aviation expert. "Which is one of the reasons airlines forbid you from carrying it on checked baggage. They want to put it in carry on, so you have access to it because if something like that happens. They want to be able to take care of it quickly."
