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Chinese passengers yank open moving plane's emergency doors after row with pilot

Passengers on a flight to Beijing pulled opened three emergency exit doors just moments before take-off after becoming irritated at delays caused by snow.

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The plane's emergency exits were forced open.

Passengers on a flight to Beijing yanked opened three emergency exit doors just moments before take-off after becoming irritated at delays caused by snow.

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The plane was taxiing in preparation for take-off when the angry passengers took action, following a row with one of the pilots.

Police investigated 25 people over the incident on the China Eastern Airlines flight, whose leg from Kunming in Yunnan province to Beijing was subsequently cancelled. Two were later locked up for 15 days' "administrative detention", police said.

The incident comes less than a month after a Chinese passenger made headlines worldwide when he pulled open an emergency door just before a plane was due to take off, to "get some fresh air".

Snow and rain had caused a three-hour delay to the first leg of flight MU2036, which departed from Dhaka in Bangladesh for Kunming, on Friday night.

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Some of the passengers who were continuing to Beijing became annoyed after learning the second leg would also be delayed for more than two hours, from 8.45pm to around 11pm, the China News Service reported.

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