Flaps Issue Prompts American Airlines Airbus A319 To Divert To Bakersfield

0 59


Wednesday’s AA2087 got more than they bargained for when the crew announced that the aircraft had to divert due to technical problems. The aircraft safely diverted to Meadows Field Airport (BFL), where emergency equipment was on standby. Luckily, they weren’t needed, and the aircraft taxied to the gate without assistance.

Technical issue

American Airlines
Flight 2087 flies nonstop from Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport
(DFW) to San Luis Obispo Country Regional Airport (SBP) daily. The airline uses an Airbus A319
narrowbody aircraft for the 1270 mi, 3 hour 30 minute flight. However, the October 9th flight had to divert to Meadows Field Airport.

American Airlines Airbus A319-132 (N825AW) departing from John Wayne Airport.

Photo: Philip Pilosian | Shutterstock

According to KGET, the pilots identified that the aircraft’s flaps, which are used to slow the aircraft down to landing speeds, were inoperable. As a result, the aircraft would have to land without flaps and at higher-than-normal speeds. While the issue doesn’t warrant an emergency landing, a Diversion
was necessary.

When an aircraft does a flapless landing, the speeds at landing are much higher, and as a result, the aircraft’s landing distance increases drastically. SBP’s longest runway is only 6,100 ft (1,859 m) long. If the brakes overheated, the aircraft could’ve potentially overrun the runway.

Therefore, the pilots decided to divert to BFL, which features a 10,855 ft (3,309 m) runway. The airport was informed of the issue and had emergency vehicles and fire trucks ready to put out any potential brake fires.

The aircraft landed safely at 11:58 PDT. No fires were reported. However, as a precaution, the fire trucks followed the aircraft to the gate. No one aboard the aircraft was injured.

According to Planespotters.net, the A319-100 that experienced the flap malfunction is a 24.3-year-old aircraft registered N744P. It was produced at Airbus’ Hamburg site. It is a former Piedmont Heritage Aircraft.

First-hand accounts

Passengers aboard the aircraft were interviewed after disembarking and were shaken but optimistic about the decision to divert.

Mike Martinez, a passenger aboard the flight, recounted his experience:

“The flight attendant came up and said hey we have a little trouble with the flaps and I said really, he said yeah they didn’t want to take the chance trying to land in San Luis Obispo. They were rerouting us to Bakersfield where the land strip was a little bit longer, little bit flatter just to be safe.”

An American Airlines Airbus A319-115 as it lands.

Photo: Markus Mainka | Shutterstock

Debbie Treece, another passenger on the flight, said:

“It was a really hard brake landing but other than that it was fine, saw some firetrucks behind us and stuff but thank god we are all okay…I was a little afraid yeah for sure. I’ll still be taking flights, yeah, unless something happened maybe a lot worse then I may have to think about that one.”

Passengers had to deboard the aircraft while it underwent repairs. They were told they would be bussed to SBP if the aircraft couldn’t be repaired. Simple Flying has contacted American Airlines for comment. Data from FlightAware shows that the aircraft took off from BFL the next day at 08:11 PDT and flew 48 minutes to SBP.

Related


Alaska Airlines Swaps Out The Embraer E175 With The Boeing 737-800 Between Seattle & San Luis Obispo

The aircraft is the largest to land on SLO County Airport’s runway.



Source link

Leave A Reply

Your email address will not be published.