An Air pushback vehicle used to move aircraft to the taxiway caught fire at the airport on Wednesday. Smoke started coming out of the vehicle when it returned to the bay after taxiing a Chennai- London Airways flight (BA 1036) at 8 am. The fire was put out using the in-built fire extinguisher of the vehicle.

The fire in the vehicle was noticed when it was at the parking stand after the aircraft had taken off. "BA1036 was not affected in any way," statement from British Airways said.

But an official from Air India said that the vehicle did not catch fire; only smoke came out of it when it was at the bay. There was panic at the airport for sometime as initially it was reported that fire was detected at the aircraft.