An American Airlines flight from St. Louis to Philadelphia turned into a terrifying ordeal for passengers on Saturday morning, with oxygen masks dropping down mid-air and passengers told to run away from the plane after an emergency landing.
American Eagle Flight 5089 was scheduled to take off at around 6 a.m. Saturday from St. Louis Lambert International Airport in Missouri, but was delayed for about two hours due to an engine issue, according to NBC affiliate KSDK in St. Louis.
“They came over the intercom and said that the engines wouldn’t start,” Olivia Clancy, a passenger on the flight, told the station. Clancy was traveling with her husband and two children, both of whom were flying for the first time.
The plane’s engines were eventually cleared for take off, but shortly after departing passengers noticed something wasn’t right with the aircraft’s thrust.
“I looked at my husband and said, ‘This is not normal,'” Clancy told KSDK. “Then, out came the airbags.”
Clancy said her family put on their oxygen masks as the aircraft struggled to maintain altitude. Passengers also reported smoke on the plane.
Passenger Tessa Springer said she was sure “the plane was going to go down” because of the way the flight crew was behaving, KSDK reported. Springer and her husband panicked and scrambled to text their children that they thought they might die
“I’ve never experienced that before. I never want to experience it again. I just thought our kids were going to lose both their parents today,” Springer told KSDK.
The pilot radioed the airport’s air traffic control tower to report the need for an emergency landing and requested “fire equipment” to assist on the tarmac, according to air traffic control audio obtained by NBC News.
“We have fumes in the cockpit, we need to expedite,” a pilot can be heard telling air traffic control.
The plane managed to turn around and returned to the St. Louis airport, landing just before 9 a.m.
Video taken from inside the plane’s cabin captured the chaotic moments after the plane touched down, with flight attendants yelling at passengers to “evacuate, evacuate, evacuate!”
“Release seatbelts, get out. Leave belonging!” a flight attendant can be heard shouting in video shared by Clancy.
Clancy told KSDK that as passengers scrambled to get off the plane, crew members told them to run. “So, we were just running … You don’t know if this plane is going to blow up,” Clancy said to KSDK.
In a statement to NBC News, a spokesperson for American Airlines said the plane landed safely after reports of an odor onboard and no injuries were reported. It added the plane was taken out of service for inspections.
“We apologize to our customers for their experience and thank our team members for their professionalism,” the statement said.
Clancy and Springer raised concerns about how the airline’s crew members and airport’s staff handled the entire situation, from failing to address the engine issue before take off to not better managing the confusion on the ground once they landed.
“At what point did they decide you’re checked, you’re cleared to take the air? What was wrong and what made it OK?” Springer told KSDK.
For Clancy, American Airlines’ response to passengers made her frustrations even worse.
“I got an email from American Airlines that said, ‘We’re so sorry about your flight, here are four $12 food vouchers that you can use for your party at the airport if you choose to stay. (It felt like) a slap in the face,” Clancy told the station.
