Japan Airlines Passengers Say It Was a ‘Miracle’ They Escaped from Burning Plane: ‘We Could Have Died’

"There was a huge impact and I looked my wife in the eyes and said 'something is absolutely not right,'” recalled one of the passengers

Harrowing stories have started to emerge from some of the 379 individuals on the Japan Airlines plane that collided with a Coast Guard aircraft on a Tokyo runway, bursting into flames.

“Everyone was screaming from the initial impact and then everything got eerily quiet because everyone was confused,” said passenger Joseph Hayashi, per The Wall Street Journal.

The incident occurred on Tuesday after JAL flight 516 struck the Coast Guard plane carrying resources for Japan’s earthquake relief efforts, according to CNN and the BBC.

All 379 crew members and passengers onboard the JAL flight were safely evacuated after the aircraft began to burn at 5:47 p.m. local time (3:47 a.m. ET), the outlets reported. However, five out of six people onboard the Coast Guard plane died in the collision, according to Reuters. The surviving pilot was severely injured and was being treated in a Tokyo hospital, reported the BBC.

Related: Pilots and Experts Warned of Rise in Near Collisions at Airports Before Deadly Japan Airlines Crash

Passenger Anton Deibe, told Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet that the cabin was consumed with smoke within minutes, per Fox News. “We threw ourselves down on the floor,” Deibe said. “Then the emergency doors were opened and we threw ourselves at them. The smoke in the cabin stung like hell. It was hell. We have no idea where we are going so we just run out into the field. It was chaos."

Speaking with SkyNews, William Manzione said he and his family were able to go down the slide during the evacuation, and felt they dodged "a really big bullet."

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"There was a huge impact and I looked my wife in the eyes and said 'something is absolutely not right,” he recalled to the outlet about the plane’s landing.

Another passenger told Reuters that "it was a miracle" everybody was able to deplane so quickly, adding, "we could have died if we were late."

As reported by the BBC, aviation experts and industry professionals cited such factors as the flight crew’s training and passengers following safety instructions that led to the successful evacuation.

"I don't see a single passenger on the ground, in any of the videos I've seen, that has got their luggage with them,” said Professor Ed Galea, director of the fire safety engineering group at London’s University of Greenwich. “If people tried to take their cabin luggage, that's really dangerous because they would slow down the evacuation."

Related: Mom and Daughter Booked Flight on Groupon for 'Beautiful Day' Together Before Deadly Plane Crash

The cause of the incident is under investigation, but in a statement on Wednesday, Japan Airlines said that the aircraft “did not experience any issues or irregularities during its departure from New Chitose Airport or throughout the flight.”

They went on to say that based on interviews with the operating crew, “they acknowledged and repeated the landing permission from air traffic control, and then proceeded with the approach and landing procedures.”

Japan’s Transport Ministry claimed that the Coast Guard aircraft was not cleared for takeoff, USA Today reported, although the captain of the Coast Guard plane claimed he did obtain permission to take off, according to Business Insider, citing Japanese news media.

Transport Minister Tetsuo Saito said to reporters, per Reuters:  "The transport ministry is submitting objective material and will fully cooperate with the ... investigation to ensure we work together to take all possible safety measures to prevent a recurrence." 

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