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A United Airlines flight bound for Newark Airport in New Jersey was forced to return to the San Diego airport after a cabin fire broke out, caused by a passenger’s laptop battery exploding.
Four flight attendants working in the cabin of the Boeing 737 on United 2664 prevented the fire from spreading further while putting out the flames with onboard fire extinguishers.
Their heroic efforts led them to breathe smoke as they put out the fire. All four were taken to hospital for treatment after the emergency landing on Tuesday.
It’s not clear what caused the battery to ignite just after the flight, with 159 passengers, took off at 7:15 a.m. Just 11 minutes later, the plane was back on the ground.
A Newark-bound United Airlines flight had to return to San Diego due to a cabin fire caused by an external battery. Fire trucks could be seen parked alongside the plane.
The fire was contained by the flight crew, but the four flight attendants were taken to hospital after breathing smoke. In the image, ambulances can be seen at the location on Tuesday morning.
Emergency services responded to the scene after a fire aboard a flight from San Diego.
The situation would have been even more dangerous if the battery pack had been inside checked baggage and not in the main cabin.
“Shortly after departure, the aircraft declared an Alert 2 indicating a significant difficulty with the aircraft, in this case there was a fire in an electrical device in the cabin.
“The aircraft landed safely at San Diego International Airport, where emergency crews responded to the aircraft and assisted passengers,” a San Diego Airport statement read.
A passenger on board the flight, Caroline Lipinski, watched it all happen from her seat.
‘There was a man whose bag was fuming and he threw something on the ground. It was a battery charger or a laptop pack from it and it caught fire.
‘There was a man whose bag was fuming and he threw something on the ground. It was a battery charger or a pack from his laptop and it caught fire,” Caroline Lipinski said.
‘Some were gasping, screaming. The guy next to me ran to the back of the plane. The flight attendants were grabbing fire extinguishers and running to the front,” Stephan Jones said.
“I heard someone yell ‘fire’. I looked ahead and could see the glow,” another traveler said.
The flight was back on the ground 11 minutes after taking off from San Diego when a fire broke out.
“I heard someone yell ‘fire’. I looked ahead and could see the glow,” another traveler said.
Fellow traveler Stephan Jones said people immediately panicked.
‘Some were gasping, screaming. The guy next to me ran to the back of the plane. The flight attendants were grabbing fire extinguishers and running to the front,’ he said. CBS News.
Since 2006, there have been 414 incidents of lithium batteries catching fire or overheating, 49 involving laptops.
The scare is just the latest in a series of scares that have hit planes in recent weeks.
The wingtip of the Orlando-bound plane was torn off in the collision at Newark Liberty International Airport.
On Friday, two United Airlines planes flapped their wings on the runway at the Newark airport as a plane was being pushed back.
The Boeing 757 bound for Orlando, Florida was struck by a Boeing 787 Dreamliner.
The pilot announced to the passengers: ‘Obviously, our wing has been clipped.’
The Federal Aviation Authority is investigating the incident.
It came a day before a near-catastrophic incident in Austin on Saturday when a FedEx cargo flight came within 100 feet of colliding with a Southwest Airlines passenger jet.
Last month, another terrifying near miss at JFK is fueling concerns about an “alarming” increase in such incidents at US airports.
During the Newark wing clipping incident, United 2135 to Orlando was parked at its gate when the larger plane, which had recently arrived from Johannesburg in South Africa, struck the wing.
Fire crews responding to the incident were seen taking the broken wingtip with them.
A Boeing 757 bound for Orlando, Florida was struck by a Boeing 787 Dreamliner at Newark Liberty International Airport on Friday.
The trip from Newark to Orlando was delayed for several hours until a replacement plane was arranged.
The Orlando-bound plane had just returned to the gate due to a maintenance issue, passenger Rebecca Blum said.
She said she felt a “shake [then] I looked out and saw as clear as day that our wing had been clipped by the wing of a larger plane. I definitely heard it. I felt it slightly I would say, but more the noise. I think we were thinking, what was that?
The passengers were able to disembark safely before another plane was arranged a couple of hours later at around 11:40am.
The FAA said: “United Flight 2135 was struck by a Boeing 787, a Dreamliner, which arrived from Johannesburg, South Africa, early in the morning. The much larger aircraft was being relocated by a tug when it made contact with the smaller Boeing 757, parked at the gate.
Photos of the damage show that a plane’s wingtip was torn off in the collision. Port Authority police and fire department crews were seen hauling away the broken piece of the wing.
The incident in Newark occurred hours before an accident in Austin. A Southwest Airlines Boeing 737, shown in yellow, had remained on the runway while a FedEx Boeing 767, shown in orange, had been cleared to land.
Less than 24 hours later, on Saturday morning, a FedEx cargo plane came within 100 feet of a Southwest commercial flight with 128 people on board during another crash in Austin.
Jennifer Homendy, president of the National Transportation Safety Board, revealed Monday that the planes narrowly avoided a disastrous collision.
The FedEx Boeing 767 flight was approaching the runway in poor visibility conditions, while a Southwest Boeing 737 had been cleared for takeoff on the same runway.
The FedEx flight was about three miles from the airport when it was cleared to land, according to the FAA.
But as it was about to land, an air traffic controller also gave the go-ahead for the Southwest Boeing 737 to take off on the exact same stretch of runway.
The Southwest flight to Cancun, Mexico continued to take off even as the FedEx cargo plane was directly overhead.
The Southwest jet was able to depart safely and the FedEx plane also landed without further incident.
It follows a similar near miss at New York City’s JFK airport in January, when a Delta flight was forced into an emergency stop during takeoff as an American Airlines Boeing 777 plane crossed the same runway.
The Delta plane came to a stop about 1,000 feet from where the American Airlines plane had crossed from an adjacent taxiway.
In another near miss at JFK on January 13, a Delta plane about to take off had to make an emergency stop after an American Airlines plane crossed onto the runway.