Anyone who's ever taken off from New York City's LaGuardia Airport knows how close to the water the runways are—and the birds that hang around that water and occasionally pose a threat to planes. Passengers on American Airlines Flight 1722 found that out the hard way on Thursday night, when a bird or birds slammed into the plane and apparently forced an emergency landing at another local airport, reports PIX11. Per flight data, the jetliner carrying 190 passengers and six crew members took off around 7:20pm ET, en route to Charlotte, North Carolina, but by just after 8pm, the aircraft had touched down at nearby JFK International.
Video captured by a producer for WCNC Charlotte and shown by NBC New York shows a fireball erupt out of one of the plane's two engines after something got sucked into it soon after takeoff. The AP reports that by 7:50pm or so, the pilot of the Airbus A321 had declared an emergency and guided the plane toward Kennedy, according to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which operates both airports. In a statement, American said the emergency landing was "due to a reported bird strike."
"The aircraft landed safely at JFK, where it will be inspected by our maintenance team," American said in its statement. "We are grateful to our crew for their professionalism and apologize to our customers for the inconvenience this may have caused." There were no injuries reported, and travelers were put up for the night in New York until their rescheduled flight on Friday. Per the Federal Aviation Administration, bird strikes (including 2009's famous "Miracle on the Hudson") have been on the rise, with nearly 20,000 logged at more than 700 US airports in 2023—though the AP notes that "rarely do they cause so much damage that commercial jetliners are forced to make emergency landings." An FAA investigation is ongoing. (More bird strike stories.)
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