Yahoo Movies Tire Falls Off United Airlines Flight After Takeoff, Hits Vehicles in Parking Lot Below
United Flight 35 departed from San Francisco and was diverted to Los Angeles shortly after takeoff
Robert Alexander/Getty Images
United Airlines Boeing 777 passenger aircraft photographed in Colorado in June 2019A tire fell off a plane shortly after it left San Francisco International Airport on Thursday, damaging vehicles parked below.
United Airlines Flight 35 — which was headed to Osaka, Japan — diverted to Los Angeles shortly after takeoff when a tire fell off the Boeing 777-200 aircraft, a United Airlines spokesperson tells PEOPLE.
Footage from the fall, shared by NBC Bay Area, showed the moment the wheel dropped from the plane, ultimately landing on two vehicles in the airport's employee parking lot. As images obtained by the outlet show, the wheel broke one vehicle's rear windshield, damaged a Tesla, bent part of a fence and eventually landed in a nearby lot.
The flight left the airport at 11:35 a.m. before the incident, a spokesperson for the San Francisco International Airport told PEOPLE.
"There were no injuries," public information officer Doug Yakel shared. "The runway was briefly closed to clear debris, but has since reopened. No further impact to airport operations."
The plane diverted to Los Angeles International Airport and United arranged for its 235 customers to board a "new aircraft" to take them to Osaka on Thursday evening, the airline shared.
The plane, which was "designed to land safely with missing or damaged tires," according to United, had 12 tires on both of its main landing gear struts.
"We’re grateful to our pilots and flight attendants for their professionalism in managing this situation," the airline said in a statement. There were 10 flight attendants and 4 pilots on board at the time.
"We’re also grateful to our teams on the ground who were waiting with a tug to move the aircraft soon after it landed and to our teams in the airport who assisted customers upon their arrival. We will work with customers as well as with the owners of the damaged vehicles in SFO to ensure their needs are addressed."
NBC Bay Area has since reported that a federal investigation into the flight is now underway.
The recent incident comes less than two months after a Delta Airlines Boeing 757 aircraft lost a tire of its own just before takeoff in Atlanta. A preliminary report by the Federal Aviation Administration noted in late January that no injuries were reported when a plane leaving Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport lost its nose wheel.
The tire issues are just the latest in a series of recent incidents on Boeing jets, including a damaged wing on another San Francisco flight, a plug door blowout on an Alaska Airlines flight in January and a softball-size hole in the fuselage of a 747 in Miami that same month — which have lead to scrutiny over the plane maker's manufacturing and safety processes.
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