FIFA World Cup 2018: Saudi Arabian team plane catches fire, lands safely

A video grab of the Saudi Arabian team aircraft on fire

The plane carrying Saudi Arabia's World Cup team suffered a fire in one of its engines as the players flew to Rostov-on-Don for their next match, the Saudi football federation said Monday. The aircraft landed safely after what one of the Saudi players called a simple malfunction.

"It was a small fire in one of the engines, the right engine, but the plane landed safely," association president Ahmad Al Harbi said. One of the Saudi players, Hatan Bahbir, said in a video on the federation's Twitter account: "We arrived safely and we are all fine... it was a simple malfunction'." In the video, someone off-camera asks him if he was scared. He replies: "No, no. Well, of course we were scared a bit, but thank God."

The Saudi Arabian Football Federation said in a statement it "would like to reassure everyone that all the Saudi national team players are safe, after a technical failure in one of the airplane engines that has just landed in Rostov-on-Don airport, and now they're heading to their residence safely". The team were flying to Rostov-on-Don for their second match, against Uruguay today, after they were thrashed 5-0 by Russia in the opening game of the tournament.

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