Officials believe passengers who pushed an aircraft after its brake pads froze might have broken air safety laws.
The passengers, many of them shift workers trying to fly home, offered to lend a hand when temperatures plunged to -52C, freezing the braking system in the aircraft’s landing gear in the parking position.
The Katekavia flight later took off from the Russian town of Igarka, which lies 100 miles north of the Arctic Circle, and landed safely in the city of Krasnoyaarsk, according to the Siberian Times.
However, prosecutors are checking whether the airport, the airline, the crew or the passengers broke air safety laws because pushing an aircraft is not generally permitted due to fears this could damage the aircraft skin, said the report.
Igarka, where temperatures of -30 are normal throughout the winter, is used by 100,000 passengers a year, many of them working on Arctic oil and gas fields.
