The US has had plenty of airline disasters in the past few months with another one almost hitting headlines as a flight nearly took off from a taxiway rather than a runway.
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A taxiway is the tarmac of an airport that planes use to move between the various areas. They are not designed to be used to land on or take off. But, as Southwest Flight 3278 moved through the motions of takeoff, the pilot made a potentially major error.
The pilot mistook one piece of tarmac for another and prepared for takeoff from the wrong area. Thankfully, the air traffic control at the time spotted the mistake. They canceled the takeoff immediately. The flight was then redirected and passengers were transferred to a plane with a slightly more savvy pilot.
Southwest Flight Failure Under Investigation
The passengers of the plane were taken off their original flight and put onto another, with a new crew. This is to give the authorities the chance to do a full investigation. Mistakes like this can't happen as a flight taking off from the wrong place could result in some serious damage.
In a statement released by Southwest, they said "Nothing is more important to Southwest than the Safety of our Customers and Employees." There will have been a breakdown in communication between several people on the runway resulting in this almost disastrous take off.
This comes after a terrible landing at Toronto Airport. A landing gear failure resulted in a passenger flight sliding and then rolling along the runway. Thankfully, in this case, nobody was killed. Only a few injuries were sustained.
Taking off from the wrong part of an airport could result in collisions, or the plane having far too little runway to use. There has been an increase in miscommunications at airports recently it seems. Whether this is due to understaffing or simply a higher rate of flights is anyone's guess.
Thankfully, this airport disaster was avoided. The mistake will make pilots much more cautious in the future. However, a full investigation will need to be made to determine how this flight almost took off from the wrong part of the airport.
