Over 160 passengers and crew on board a Lufthansa flight from Munich to Mumbai had a providential escape after all four back tyres of the Airbus aircraft were damaged while landing at the Mumbai airport.

The 163 passengers on board the Airbus A330 flight were deplaned through stairs and none of them were hurt, the airline said.

The incident, that took place on Friday night, forced the Mumbai airport to shift the operations to the secondary runway, leading to cancellation of many international flights besides delays.

While the aviation regulator Director General of Civil Aviation has initiated a probe into the incident, experts say the damage to the tyres could have been caused either by manual braking or landing at a speed higher than the prescribed limit.

Besides the four tyres at the back of the aircraft, there are two in front.

"It can't be a tyre issue. It is next to impossible that all four rear tyres of the aircraft get damaged at the same time. In this case, prima facie, it appears to be either a snag in the braking system or the pilot landing at an unusually high speed," a former DGCA official said.

He also ruled out any possibility of the incident occurring due to any problem in the runway surface. There has not been any instances of such an accident being reported in the country in recent memory though aviation industry officials said such accidents are not very rare.