United flight drops debris in Colorado neighborhood in emergency landing

A United Airlines flight made an emergency safe landing on Saturday after experiencing engine failure shortly after take-off. Large pieces of debris fell from the plane and on a residential area in Colorado, damaging property and triggering a federal investigation into what was wrong.

United Flight 328, carrying 231 passengers and 10 crew, was to fly from Denver to Honolulu. It took off around noon but was forced to return to Denver International Airport after takeoff, the airline said in a statement. None of the passengers or employees were injured.

“A Boeing 777-200 operated by United Airlines returned to Denver International Airport and landed safely on Saturday after suffering a failure of the right engine shortly after take-off,” the Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement.

“The passengers disembarked on runway 26-right and were transported by bus to the terminal,” added the FAA.

Police in the town of Broomfield, about 16 miles north of Denver, responded to reports of metal debris falling from the plane around 1 p.m. The debris was scattered in three different quarters. Local firefighters said houses and a few vehicles were damaged. Police said no one on the ground was injured.

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg appeared on MSNBC’s “Politics Nation” shortly after debris began to fall from the sky and said the incident was “obviously concerning.” Buttigieg said the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) is mobilizing so that an independent body can piece together what happened.

“I want to make sure that we understand what happened and that we increase the feeling of security,” he said.

“A lot of people said they heard a really loud explosion, which surprised a lot of people, then they just started to roughly see (what) they thought was a plane falling from the sky,” the spokesperson said. from the police, Rachel Welte. journalists.

Welte said the area is generally busy but residents were indoors due to the cold weather. “This park, on a day like today, when it’s not as cold as last weekend, we could have hundreds of people here.”

The FAA and the NTSB are both investigating the incident. According to the FAA, the NTSB “will be in charge of the investigation and provide additional updates.”

The FAA said it was aware of reports of debris near the plane’s flight path, and the NTSB is asking anyone with debris to contact local law enforcement.