( CNN ) -- Ten people suffered minor injuries Monday when the nose gear of a Southwest Airlines jetliner collapsed after landing at New York 's LaGuardia Airport , the city 's Port Authority reported . Southwest Flight 345 was landing at LaGuardia from Nashville about 5:40 p.m. when the accident occurred . The nose of the blue-and-orange jet came to rest on the ground after the aircraft came to a stop , and passengers evacuated the aircraft on emergency slides . `` The aircraft skidded down the runway on its nose and then veered off and came to rest in a grass area between the runway and taxiway foxtrot , '' Thomas Bosco , the airport 's general manager , told reporters . It stopped about halfway down the 7,000-foot runway . Kathy Boles , a passenger aboard the Boeing 737 , said a `` strong jolt '' could be felt inside the cabin when the gear failed and the nose slammed into the tarmac . `` It was just a bang and a bounce , and then a slam on the brakes and a skidding feeling , '' Boles told CNN 's `` Anderson Cooper 360 . '' `` I feel extremely blessed to have come off that , '' she said . `` It just really felt like the plane could have broken in half , it was such a hard impact . '' Fellow passenger Anastasia Elliot said the situation was `` pretty chaotic . '' `` We hit the ground pretty hard and slid , '' she said . `` There was a lot of smoke filling the plane , just a lot of smoke and burnt rubber . '' Another passenger said it felt like the plane crashed and then skidded to a stop . `` Everything in the plane that was loose went flying forward , '' Bill Roland said . `` There were cell phones , iPads , books ( and ) drinks all skidded up . '' A total of 150 people were aboard the flight . In addition to the 10 injured aboard the plane , a Port Authority police officer was treated for heat exhaustion , Bosco said . There were conflicting reports about how many members of the aircraft 's crew were among the injured . Southwest said three flight attendants had reported being hurt , while Bosco said the six-member crew had been taken to a hospital for observation . LaGuardia was closed to arriving flights as emergency vehicles surrounded the disabled jet , but the airport was back open for arrivals and departures by 7 p.m. , Bosco said . Initially , the Federal Aviation Administration said the crew reported a possible nose gear problem before landing , but later amended that to say that after it reviewed air controller tapes , no issues were noted ahead of time . The National Transportation Safety Board was aware of the incident and sent an investigator to the scene . The incident followed a runway crash of an Asiana jetliner in San Francisco last month that killed three people and injured more than 180 others . Investigators in that crash will not determine a cause for several months at least but initial attention has focused on actions of the crew during approach . The 737 has a conventional hydraulic landing gear system -- a unit under each wing and a steerable wheel that extends from under the nose . Pilots can land safely with only the main gear operable and such incidents occur from time to time . Southwest has more than 600 of the 737s in its fleet , including those operated by its subsidiary AirTran . In May : Plane lands without landing gear at Newark . CNN 's Caleb Silver contributed to this report .
Port Authority says 10 people suffered minor injuries . Passenger describes `` a bang and a bounce '' as nose gear fails . Nose gear fails on Southwest Airlines Flight 345 as it lands at LaGuardia . FAA says pilots did not report any problems before landing .