A United Airlines plane bound for Edmonton, Alberta was forced to make an emergency landing after a rabbit was sucked into the engine earlier this month, according to audio recording of the flight.
“Every once in a while, a little burst of flame’s coming out the right engine,” said a crew member in a recording posted by LiveATC.net, a website that provides
live feeds of air traffic control
. The plane took off, leaving the Denver International Airport on April 13 just after 7 p.m.,
per flight tracker FlightAware
. However, the aircraft didn’t make it to its destination. Instead, one of the pilots declared that there was an emergency on United Airlines flight 2325.
“We think we lost our right motor,” said the pilot.
The crew was told a rabbit had gone through the engine just as the plane was leaving the runway,
.
The pilot replied: “Rabbit through the number two, that’ll do it.”
Per ABC News, there were 153 passengers and six crew members on the flight.
One video shared by Edmonton-based social media account YEGWAVE on Instagram showed the inside of the plane during the incident. Passengers could be heard shouting “fire” as flashes of yellow lit up the cabin.
One passenger
Scott Wolff told Good Morning America
he heard “a loud bang” and there was “a significant vibration in the plane.”
“Every few moments there was a backfire coming from the engine, a giant fireball behind it,” said Wolff. “Everyone in the plane then started to panic.”
Although the flames continued, Wolff said the plane continued to climb. The Boeing 737-800 ended up returning to the Denver airport “after the crew reported striking an animal while departing,” the
Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said
. Per FlightAware, the plane landed around 8:20 p.m. — less than an hour and a half after takeoff.
One person, Wyatt McCurry, saw the engine fire from the airport. He told Good Morning America his stomach dropped.
“I just thought, ‘I’m going to see a plane go down,’” he said.
“Our flight from Denver to Edmonton (UA2325) returned safely to Denver to address a possible wildlife strike,” said United Airlines in a statement to ABC News. A
spokesperson for the airline told People Magazine
that after the aircraft returned to the gate, the airline “lined up a new aircraft to get our customers on their way.” FlightAware shows that another plane
just after 10:10 p.m. the same evening, and arrived in Edmonton at 1 a.m. on April 14.
, wildlife strikes with planes are increasing in the United States and elsewhere. “About 291,600 wildlife strikes with civil aircraft were reported in USA between 1990 and 2023,” the administration said, with about 19,400 strikes at 713 U.S. airports in 2023 alone.
“Expanding wildlife populations, increases in number of aircraft movements, a trend toward faster and quieter aircraft, and outreach to the aviation community all have contributed to the observed increase in reported wildlife strikes,” the FAA said.
There have been around 75 incidents involving rabbits between 1992 and 2024, according to the FAA’s wildlife strike database. In 2024, there were only four such incidents.
The FAA is investigating the incident.
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