GRAND RAPIDS, Mich — A flight from Grand Rapids to Minneapolis had to make an emergency landing at Gerald R. Ford Airport Friday morning after engine troubles.
Delta Flight 2706 took off from Gerald R. Ford Airport around 7:30 a.m. and about 30 minutes later reported engine trouble.
Gerald R. Ford Airport says that they received an alert from the aircraft at approximately 8 a.m. for issues with an engine.
The airport alerted their Aircraft Rescue and Fire Fighting team and mutual aid partners to standby and assist as needed to ensure the safety of the passengers.
About 20 minutes after the report, the plane landed safely back in Grand Rapids at around 8:20 a.m.
There were 141 passengers, 2 pilots and 4 attendants on board the flight during the incident.
No injuries were reported in regards to this incident.
A passenger on the plane told 13 ON YOUR SIDE that he heard a loud boom outside of the cabin of the aircraft shortly before the plane turned around and headed back to Grand Rapids.
According to Raymond Thompson, the Interim Dean at Western Michigan University's College of Aviation, a loud boom isn't an unusual noise for an engine failure.
There may have been a potential failure of the compressor or turbine section of the airplane engine.
"Often times the 'bang' heard is it starts to come apart and hits the containment shield that's built in to keep any parts away from the plane's cabin," said Thompson.
An engine failure on a commercial flight is very, very rare as they're reliable and get routine maintenance.
"For an engine failure, it can be due to a variety of causes, but we have more issues generally with the ingestion of a larger bird causing an engine failure than an engine mechanically failing themselves," said Thompson.
There are two primary engines on planes, but for them to be certified, they have to be able to fly with only one engine.
If this was a failure, the pilot would shut the engine down, get the plane level and stable, and then return to the nearest airport which is the safest option.
Thompson says potentially something else such as a piece of metal coming off could've caused the loud boom, but that's even rarer than an engine failure.
Delta brought in another plane for those heading to Minneapolis and rebooked passengers who were heading elsewhere on connecting flights.
The cause of the engine problem is currently being investigated by Delta's maintenance team.
Delta has issued a statement regarding the flight.
“As nothing is more important than the safety of our customers and people, the flight crew of Delta flight 2706 followed procedures to return to Grand Rapids after departure when a performance issue with one of the aircraft’s two engines was observed. Customers have continued on this flight to our Minneapolis/St. Paul hub on another aircraft. We apologize for the delay in their travel plans.”
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