The incident that happened around 7:30 pm in the evening is being seen as a major security and safety breach.
A serious accident was averted this evening when an aircraft with 49 passengers onboard collided with wild boars, went off the runway and then came to a stop. The incident happened when the SpiceJet flight from Mumbai to Jabalpur was landing.
Though the plane - a Bombardier Q400 - is reported to have suffered damage in the collision, all the passengers are safe. Three animals were killed.
"All passengers have been safely evacuated and no one has sustained any injury," Airline officials told NDTV.
At 7:30 pm, when the commander of the aircraft Amartya Basu touched down at Jabalpur he was forced to apply hard brakes after spotting wild boars on the runway. As he tried to manoeuvre the aircraft towards safety, the plane went slightly out of control and skidded off the runway.
"This could have been a tragic accident had it not been for the quick thinking of the pilot," an airline source told NDTV. Captain Basu has more than 10,000 hours of flying experience, of which 2,000 hours were on Q 400 type of aircraft.
The incident raises serious questions on the safety of runway operations at the Jabalpur airport. As per civil aviation rules, a runway should be completely free from any kind of obstruction at the time of landing or take off.
So far, neither the airline nor the Airports Authority of India has issued an official statement.