Lots of confusion on this one. Looks like the walkway was hooked up to the air aircraft when the fire started. The aircraft may have been “off” because flaps have to set at 40 degrees for the wing exits to be operated safely on that version of the 737-800 since there are no slides..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9zzt9bNKQ8
Thank you! Excellent video that answers all my questions. They WERE at the gate, the jet bridge was attached, which means the doors had all been disarmed. The media made it sound like everyone went out the over wing exits (right over the fire), when the majority evacuated off the jet bridge. So the “aviation expert” who said “the slide wasn’t deployed because the jetway was in the way” is an absolute idiot. (I hate our media!) Jetway would always be first choice in this situation, because people get hurt going down slides. (If you’ve never jumped off an aircraft slide, it feels like you’re jumping straight off a cliff. If your form isn’t perfect, ie, pike position with feet out in front of you, you will tumble.) And from the video, I see that they eventually did open a rear door and deploy a slide there. So the wing exits were initiated by passengers, and crew wouldn’t have much control over that. Pilots may not even have known the exits were being opened in order to lower flaps, as that’s not something they do at the gate after engine shutdown. Man, that crew is in for one hell of a FAA debriefing.
Also, as far as I recall (and I quit flying 20 years ago, so a lot of new equipment has been introduced since then), the only planes that had over wing slides were the 747 and 777. Maybe the 767? My airline didn’t have any wide body Airbus, so not sure about those.