Passengers describe escape from upside-down Delta jet at Toronto's Pearson Airport

Passengers have said they were left dangling upside down with fuel running down the windows when their plane flipped over in Toronto.

All 80 people on board were evacuated - with 19 of the 21 passengers taken to hospital now discharged, according to Delta Airlines.

The crash happened on Monday afternoon at Pearson Airport, with video showing the plane skidding in flames and rolling over after it touched down.

Many passengers were able to walk off the upturned jet unaided.

The Delta Airlines jet, a CRJ900, was arriving from Minneapolis-St. Paul in the US - about 700 miles away.

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The cause is so far unknown, but passengers said the crash seemed to happen in seconds.

Pete Koukov told NBC News, Sky's US partner network: "The wheels touched down... I was in the window seat on the lookers left side, and then all of a sudden, I just remember being fully sideways.

"I was looking down and just seeing like sparks and flames and whatever was grinding against the ground.

"It happened pretty dang quick and we were just upside down, hanging from our seat belts."

Mr Koukov praised the flight attendants for a "pretty organised" evacuation and said "everyone got off in a pretty orderly fashion".

Another passenger, John Nelson, told CNN some people needed help freeing themselves from their seats.

"We hit the ground, and we were sideways, and then we were upside down," he recalled.

"I was able to just unbuckle and sort of fall and push myself to the ground. And then some people were kind of hanging and needed some help being helped down, and others were able to get down on their own."

Speaking to CBS News, Peter Carlson said he was worried a fire could engulf the jet.

"All the sudden everything just kind of went sideways and then next thing I know it's kind of a blink and I'm upside down still strapped in," he said.

Mr Carlson said he smelled aviation fuel and saw it streaming down the windows.

He said he knew he needed to get out quickly in case a fire started, but that he and another man first helped free a mother and her young son.

At least one of the wings was broken off after the crash but the main body appeared intact, according to video of the scene.

The Canadian airport had more than 22cm (8.6in) of snow over the weekend, and earlier on Monday had said it was dealing with high winds and freezing temperatures.

Audio from the control tower shows it warned the Delta flight of a possible air flow "bump" on the approach.

Tracking website Flightradar24 also said indications suggested a "gusting crosswind and blowing snow" but the airport's fire chief, Todd Aitken, disputed that analysis.

Emergency personnel got to the plane within a few minutes and the response "went as planned", Mr Aitken added.

Canada's Transportation Safety Board and its US equivalent are now investigating what caused the jet - operated by Delta subsidiary Endeavor Air - to flip over so dramatically.

Delta chief executive Ed Bastian said "the hearts of the entire global Delta family are with those affected."

Michael J. McCormick, a professor of air traffic management, said the fact everyone survived was "a testament to the engineering and the technology [and] the regulatory background".

He added that "not too long ago" such an incident would likely have been fatal.

Aircraft flipping over, while rare, is not unheard of.

Two pilots died in 2009 when a FedEx plane crashed during landing in Tokyo, and a decade earlier a China Airlines flight also inverted, killing three of the 315 people on board.

Another incident involving a FedEx cargo flight happened in Newark in 1997 - but no one died.

All those crashes involved a McDonnell Douglas MD-11 aircraft.

Flights have restarted at Pearson Airport but passengers have been warned of lingering delays over the next few days.

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The incident comes after two recent crashes in North America.

Last month 67 people were killed when an army helicopter collided with a passenger jet in Washington DC. In a separate incident, at least seven people died in a medical transport plane crash in Philadelphia.

(c) Sky News 2025: Passengers describe escape from upside-down Delta jet at Toronto's Pearson Air