SAN DIEGO (KGTV) – A scary situation at San Diego International Airport as passengers on a flight bound for Hawaii have to deplane after smoke comes inside the plane.
San Diego Fire Department officials said an “Alert 2" was called in after the takeoff was called off because heavy smoke in the main cabin.
An airport official told ABC 10News the brake on the plane got too hot before takeoff.
According to the FAA, “The crew of Alaska Airlines Flight 815 aborted their takeoff from San Diego International Airport around 10:10 a.m. local time on Thursday, Sept. 3. The Airbus A332 was headed to Daniel K. Inouye International Airport in Hawaii. The FAA will investigate.”
The plane was deboarded, according to the San Diego Airport officials, and the aircraft was being evaluated.
This happened just as the Labor Day travel season began.
“I am actually returning home, and yesterday on a connecting flight from Washington D.C., the plane was delayed for about an hour and a half because one of the doors couldn't quite shut during the safety check,” Roland Bueno, who was traveling to Hawaii, said.
“But I was traveling with a coworker, and she's already delayed unfortunately, so she's headed back to San Francisco today,” Bianca Difonzo-Smith, who was traveling to Arkansas, said.
ABC 10News saw that upwards of 200 flights were delayed at San Diego International at one point on Thursday.
When we asked the FAA if the flight delays were due to the situation involving Flight 815, the agency told us, “the delays were due to volume,” essentially too many aircraft looking to fly in and out of America’s Finest City.
The airport also said the FAA put a ground delay in place at around 8 a.m., well before the situation with the Hawaiian Airlines plane. A spokesperson also told ABC 10News, “the aircraft promptly moved off the runway to a taxiway, so it was not in a position to significantly affect flight schedules.”
Still, delays are always on the minds of plenty of travelers heading into a holiday weekend.
“I'm definitely a frequent traveler, so I use the app a lot and track, you know, the inbound flight to see if I'm going to have any delays, and I try to play it as close as I can to the departure time,” Difonzo-Smith said.
“I'm just more aware of things that might come up, you know, so that may not weather related because I know there's a hurricane coming to Hawaii, for example, but you know mechanical things, like I say, always come up, so I just kind of roll the punches,” Bueno said.
Alaska Airlines sent ABC 10News the following statement about the situation involving Flight 85: “During initial takeoff on Thursday, Sept 3, the pilots on Alaska Airlines Flight 815 operated as Hawaiian Airlines from San Diego (SAN) to Honolulu (HNL) were notified of a mechanical issue and chose to abort the takeoff as a precautionary measure. The crew followed standard procedures for this situation and landed safely and without incident. The aircraft is in review with our maintenance team, and the flight has been cancelled. We are rebooking all impacted guests and apologize for any concern or inconvenience this situation caused.”
