An American Airlines flight departing from Los Angeles encountered a frightening engine malfunction Wednesday morning, but two aircraft mechanics onboard say the emergency landing was unexpectedly calm and controlled.
The plane, Flight AA 1665, from Las Vegas to Charlotte, North Carolina, experienced a sudden surge of sparks and smoke shortly after takeoff.
“We took off, and as soon as the pilots put the gear up, it was like pop, pop, pop over and over,” Paige Mitchell, an airplane mechanic in Las Vegas, told Fox 5. “You could kind of see like orange and yellow, like glowing, like every time you hear the pop.”
Michael Lockett, a fellow passenger and Air Force veteran with decades of experience working on military aircraft, said the sound was immediately recognizable and alarming.
“With my background, as soon as it happened, I knew kind of what it was because I’ve seen it on Air Force aircraft before,” Lockett told the outlet.
Lockett remained outwardly calm but admitted to mentally bracing for the worst.
“I already knew it was an engine failure,” he said. “I didn’t say anything out loud because I didn’t want to, you know, get people riled up, so the most I did was just pray until we got back on the ground.”
Mitchell said her mechanical instincts also had her bracing for a rough landing, but she was impressed by how smoothly the pilots brought the plane down, with emergency crews meeting passengers the ground in Vegas.
“I was like ‘oh, this is going to be rough’, but no, they actually put us down really nicely, and as soon as we hit the ground, they stopped, and there was fire trucks and police waiting for us,” she said, adding that the landing was“one of the smoothest landings I’ve ever experienced.”
Both AA and the FAA told The Independent that Wednesday’s emergency return was due to a “mechanical issue.”
“The aircraft taxied to the gate under its own power, and customers deplaned normally. We appreciate the professionalism of our crew and thank our team who are working to get our customers to their destinations as quickly as possible,” an AA spokesman said.
The FAA continues to investigate Wednesday’s engine issue before the plane can make future flights.
