The A-319, operating as Flight AI 940, with over 130 passengers on board, made an emergency landing around 3 am (IST) after the aircraft developed a technical snag. Passengers spent the night inside the airport terminal building.

The commander decided to make the unscheduled stop in nawabshah after suspecting hydraulic failure in the Airbus, which was an endemic problem in its old generation A-320s.

All the three hydraulic systems are learnt to have failed on this aircraft. Luckily the plane landed safely and all the 122 passengers and 8 crew members are learnt to be unhurt.

According to the sources, “We had offered full cooperation to them but the Airbus captain did not allow the passengers to disembark and requested just for drinking water,” Sultan Hasan, spokesman for the state-run Pakistan International Airlines (PIA), told AFP.

Meanwhile the rescue flight took off from New Delhi around 11.30 am and reached Nawabshah after 1.5 hours. (Agencies)