United Airlines is facing safety concerns after five serious aircraft accidents this week, three of which occurred in the past two days.
A United Airbus flight from Chicago O’Hare was forced to return to the Windy City Saturday due to maintenance issues, the airline told the Post.
The airline said the customer was scheduled to fly to Salt Lake City on another flight.
The incident was just the latest in a series of mishaps for United.
United Flight 821 took off from San Francisco International Airport on Friday afternoon and was headed to Mexico City, but was quickly diverted to Los Angeles “due to an issue with the aircraft’s hydraulic system,” an airline representative said Saturday. he told the Post.
“The plane landed safely and passengers disembarked normally at the gate,” the official said.
The Airbus 320’s hydraulic system experienced a problem with one of its three hydraulic units. the airline told NBC Bay Area.. Aircraft are equipped with multiple systems for redundancy.
105 passengers and five crew members were evacuated and customers had to be flown to their destinations on new aircraft.
The FAA is investigating.
On another United flight on Friday, a Boeing plane rolled onto the grass as it exited the taxiway and veered off the runway in Houston, the FAA said.
All 160 passengers were evacuated and there were no injuries.
Video showed the plane’s left wing touching the ground as passengers were being bussed to the tarmac.
A Boeing flight heading from San Francisco to Japan on Thursday had a tire fall off during takeoff and had to be diverted to Los Angeles as well.
Several cars at the airport were damaged by the falling landing gear. United Airlines confirmed that all 235 passengers landed safely at LAX.
And on Monday, another Boeing plane was forced to make an emergency landing after one of its engines exploded minutes after takeoff.
The plane had to land in Houston after heavy flames were visible through the passenger’s left window.
There have been a number of incidents involving Boeing aircraft recently, starting with an Alaska Airlines passenger plane in January when a door plug was seen coming off during flight.
An FAA panel of experts previously criticized Boeing’s “lack of awareness of safety-related metrics at all levels of the organization” in February.
However, Boeing told the Post on Saturday that it is “closely monitoring the situation and will provide United Airlines and the investigating authorities with all necessary assistance.”
Several incidents this week have left customers worried, with one X user wondering: “Is it safe to book?”
“What’s going on with United Airlines?” they wrote on the social media platform.
“I feel warm and fuzzy thinking this is the fourth United Airlines emergency this week.” one person jokedreferring to the Mexican plane crash.
“Oh. How is airline maintenance going these days?” another person asked.
United Airlines said in a statement that it “takes all safety incidents seriously and will investigate each incident that occurred this week to understand what happened and learn from it.”
“Much of this work is being done in collaboration with manufacturers, the FAA, and the NTSB, as well as the manufacturers of the individual components. This work is ongoing, but each of these events is separate and mutually exclusive. Unrelated. Safety is our top priority and we will continue to do everything we can to keep our customers and employees safe.”
