MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Five dead as a cargo jet operating for Amazon overruns the runway at Miami airport

At least five people were killed and five others injured on Sunday when a cargo aircraft operating for Amazon overran the runway on landing at Miami International Airport, broke through the perimeter fence and a service road and struck several vehicles before catching fire.

The aircraft, a 32-year-old Boeing 767-300 freighter, was operating 21 Air flight 7598 and had departed from Luis Muñoz Marín airport in San Juan, Puerto Rico. It landed at around 2pm local time on runway 30, the northwest-facing diagonal, and failed to stop within the airfield boundary, according to the Federal Aviation Administration.

Miami-Dade County sheriff Rosie Cordero-Stutz confirmed the five deaths at a press conference. County mayor Daniella Levine Cava reported five injured, among them both pilots, without specifying their condition. “My heart is with their families,” she said. More than sixty county fire units were deployed to tackle the blaze, which sent up a dense column of smoke visible from several parts of the city.

The airport closed all runways and taxiways from 3pm and imposed a ground stop, in the middle of the Labor Day weekend, one of the busiest for air travel in the United States.

The aircraft was operated by 21 Air, an independent US cargo carrier flying on behalf of Amazon Air. The technology company does not hold its own air operator certificate for these services and contracts external carriers. Amazon confirmed the flight was being operated on its behalf. Its air network runs around 250 flights a day at some 60 airports across four continents.

Airfield weather records show a thunderstorm at the time of landing, with winds of 17 knots gusting to 26 and cumulonimbus formations at 2,000 feet. The investigation has not begun and no connection with those conditions has been established.

The Federal Aviation Administration said it would investigate the accident. In the United States, civil aviation accident investigations are led by the National Transportation Safety Board, whose involvement is expected in incidents of this severity.

The most serious previous accident involving Amazon's cargo network occurred in February 2019, when a Boeing 767 operated by Atlas Air for the company crashed into a bay in Texas, killing its three crew. The investigation concluded the accident was caused by pilot error.