Exciting Day At The Airport

Fire is the big danger, of course, and I'm glad it didn't get away from them:

But for the 86 passengers of JetBlue Flight 262 from Long Beach, who left their burning plane on exit slides, the afternoon was nerve-wracking.

"It was a crazy experience you don't expect on a Thursday," said Stacey Benuzzi, 27, an 8th-grade teacher from Long Beach who was on her way to visit family in Rio Linda.

Benuzzi was sitting in the middle of the Airbus A320 when it landed hard at about 12:50 p.m. There was a bang, followed by the flight attendants' calls to exit the plane, she said.

As passengers surged toward the doorways, some reached for bags in the overhead bins.

"This plane is on fire. Get out of the plane," a flight attendant yelled from the rear of the jet, Benuzzi said.

Passengers "moved a lot faster," she said.

Benuzzi got to the rear exit and was surprised to see the slide. She and two other passengers jumped nearly at once, their bodies tangling on the way down, she said.

Her flip-flops came off and she ran across the pavement barefoot.