It's been a pretty bad 24 hours or so for air travel. First Mike Pence's plane skids off a runway. Then a plane catches on fire while taking off in Chicago. And on Friday evening, a trifecta was reached when a FedEx plane exploded into flames while landing in Fort Lauderdale.
According to the FAA, the plane's landing gear collapsed around 5 p.m., just as it was touching down in Florida from Memphis. The fire was put out within an hour, and the cargo plane's pilots managed to escape to safety.
According to Stephen Lloyd, a former safety director for the FAA, those pilots earned their pay. "I think the pilot did a pretty good job of keeping it close to the runway, but of course you can see the ball of fire and with all that fuel, that was a pretty big explosion," Lloyd told Miami station WPLG.
Flights from the airport were temporarily suspended, but resumed at 7 p.m..
Plenty of people at the airport got footage of the fire. You can see some of it below:
