- A Southwest Airlines Boeing 737-700 on Tuesday suffered an uncontained engine failure.
- A ground stop was issued for Philadelphia International Airport.
- One passenger died as a result of the incident.
A Southwest Airlines flight was forced to make an emergency landing in Philadelphia after one of its engines suffered a major mid-flight failure.
One passenger died as a result of the incident, National Transporation Safety Board chairman Robert Sumwalt said in a press conference.
According to Philadelphia fire commissioner Adam Thiel, seven other passengers were treated for minor injuries.
The failure, which caused the front of the engine to disintegrate, sprayed shrapnel that penetrated the cabin of the Boeing 737-700, causing the jet to depressurize.
Southwest Airlines Flight 1380 was en route from LaGuardia Airport in New York to Love Field in Dallas when the incident occurred.
A ground stop was issued for Philadelphia International Airport following the incident. Southwest Airlines issued the following statement on its website:
“We are aware that Southwest flight #1380 from New York La Guardia (LGA) to Dallas Love Field (DAL) has diverted to Philadelphia International Airport (PHL). We are in the process of transporting Customers and Crew into the terminal. The aircraft, a Boeing 737-700, has 143 Customers and five Crewmembers onboard. We are in the process of gathering more information. Safety is always our top priority at Southwest Airlines, and we are working diligently to support our Customers and Crews at this time.”
Boeing said in a statement via Twitter that it was working on gathering information.
The aircraft has been identified as N772SW. According to the Federal Aviation Administration, the 17.8-year-old Boeing 737-700 was delivered new to Southwest Airlines in July 2000.
The NTSB team was expected to arrive in Philadelphia on Tuesday afternoon, with experts in various areas including power plants and airworthiness.
According to NTSB chairman Sumwalt, an experienced Boeing 737 pilot, the plane’s black-box recorders were recovered and would be in Washington, DC, for analysis Tuesday evening.
The aircraft was powered by a pair of CFM International CFM56 engines. CFM is a joint venture between GE Aviation and France’s Safran Aircraft engines.
Sumwalt said the damaged engine would be transported to an off-site location where investigators could do a tear-down to figure out what happened.
Some passengers on the flight shared details about the incident on social media.
Passenger Kristopher Johnson said on Twitter that the crew had done a great job of getting the aircraft down to the ground safely and posted an image of the damaged engine.
“All of the sudden we heard this loud bang, rattling,” Johnson told CNN. “Felt like one of the engines went out. Oxygen masks dropped.”
Johnson said that shrapnel pierced a window of the aircraft.
Tweet Embed: //twitter.com/mims/statuses/986269126263033858?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw@SouthwestAir I want to thank the crew of SWA 1380 for a great job getting us to the ground safely after losing in engine #angelsinthesky pic.twitter.com/QL0YPUp0Vj
Another passenger, Marty Martinez, posted a video to Facebook showing what it was like inside the plane during the landing.
Martinez also told CBS that there was an explosion that blew out the window and that “there was blood everywhere.”
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