A Boeing cargo plane headed for Puerto Rico made an emergency landing at Miami International Airport Thursday night after one of its engines caught fire shortly after takeoff.
The Boeing 747 was on its way to Luis Muñoz Marin International Airport in Puerto Rico when the crew reported an engine failure, the Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement Friday. Atlas Air Flight 95 then returned safely to Miami International Airport, the agency said.
"Mayday, mayday...We have an engine fire," the pilot can be heard telling air traffic control, in audio obtained by NBC Miami. "Request access back to the airport. No, we'll go ahead and land. We have five souls onboard."
A witness captured cellphone video that shows cargo plane flying across the sky as flames trailed it.
The airplane was “shooting sparks" as it flew overhead, said Melanie Adaros, who was out for a walk with her mother and was about to turn into her home, when she heard and saw an approaching plane.
“There’s always planes flying overhead, but they’re little planes,” she said. “But this didn’t sound like a little plane. It sounded very low, so I turned ... You always see a plane going up or going down. This one was just at a steady level and it was shooting sparks. It was very surreal.”
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She recorded it with her phone, wondering "is it falling? Is it going to explode?” she said. “It seemed to do a big, wide, swerving turn” in the direction of Miami International Airport, she said.
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On Friday, the FAA said it found a "softball-sized hole" above one of the plane's engines.
The incident is the latest in a string of issues involving Boeing planes. It comes two weeks after a panel on an Alaska Airlines plane detached mid-flight. The case prompted the FAA to ground Boeing 737 Max 9 planes across the U.S. as it inspects those aircrafts.
Atlas Air hauls everything from machinery to perishable food and pharmaceuticals, and also provides charter services for passengers, according to its website. The company's parent firm, Atlas Air Worldwide, recently announced that it planned to move its headquarters from Purchase, New York, to White Plains, New York, this month.
