A United Airlines plane plummeted into the ocean shortly after taking off from Hawaii, the pilots managed to level off just 250 meters above the water, US media reported on Tuesday. The dangerous incident involving the Boeing 777 occurred in December, but the results of the investigation into it have not been released. CNN has reached out to the passengers who survived this dramatic flight.
The incident involving a United Airlines flight from Hawaii to San Francisco occurred on December 18, 2022. A minute after takeoff from Kahului Airport on the island of Maui, the Boeing 777 suddenly began to rapidly lose altitude. The plane was falling from a height of 670 meters above the ocean surface, and it took the pilots 18 seconds to lift its nose and level the flight. They were only about 250 meters (800 feet) above the water at the time, according to data available on the FlightRadar24 website.
The Boeing was falling into the ocean
Neither the carrier nor the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) reported that anyone on board was injured as a result of the incident. It is also not known what caused it. United Airlines, in its response to Business Insider, only stated that the pilots of the Boeing 777 had a total of 25,000. hours of the flight, and after this event they underwent additional training. The FAA conducted an official investigation into the matter, but did not make its findings public. CNN on Tuesday, February 14, released a message from the FAA saying that the results of the investigation could not be made public because “the confidentiality of this program is critical to its success.”
On the same day, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) announced on Twitter that it had launched its own investigation into the December incident involving a United Airlines Boeing 777. An initial report is expected to be released in the next 2-3 weeks.
The passenger recalls the screams on board
Meanwhile, CNN has reached out to the passengers who survived this dramatic flight. One of them was Rod Williams, a man traveling with his wife and two children: a 7-year-old son and a 10-year-old daughter. As he recalled, the plane seemed to be flying normally right after take-off, but after a while it began to climb for a few seconds at “an alarming speed”. “It felt like we were going to the top of a roller coaster. There were screams. Everyone knew something was wrong,” Williams said.
Then the plane stopped ascending and began to fall sharply. Williams admitted that he began praying as the plane “dramatically dived nose down.” “It’s the kind of tension where you really don’t get a chance to say anything, you just grab your seat and pray,” he added. The pilots finally managed to lift the nose of the machine and sharply leveled the flight. According to Rod Williams, after about 10 minutes, the cabin crew was to tell passengers that “everything will be fine”, and the plane continued its flight without changes. He arrived in San Francisco without further problems.
That the plane was so close to the ocean’s surface when it fell, Williams did not learn until eight weeks later, when his father gave him a report of the incident. – Now that I know we were about 5 seconds from hitting the water, I’m definitely counting my lucky days. I’m reminded that when my wife and I pray before flights, you know, there’s God in it.
NTSB, CNN, Business Insider
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