Officials say a Southwest Airlines flight almost took off from a taxiway — rather than a runway — at a central Florida airport on Thursday before an air traffic controller stopped the plane.

No injuries were reported, and passengers departing Orlando International Airport were accommodated on another aircraft heading to their destination of Albany, New York, the airline said in a statement. The aircraft was switched to help facilitate an investigation.

Southwest Flight 3278 had been cleared for takeoff and initiated a takeoff roll on a taxiway after the crew mistook the surface for the nearby runway, officials said. But air traffic controllers canceled the clearance before the plane could take off.

  • meeeeetch@lemmy.world
    4·
    18 hours ago

    It’s about the same number of incidents (plane crashes, death agnostic), it’s just that a week into the new admin, one of them had the most deaths since the autopilot that aims for the ground crashed those planes in 2019.

    But since the other side is willing to just outright lie, it’s not exactly a high crime not to highlight that technically it’s the same number of crashes.