Summary
- Atlas Air Boeing 747-8F experienced an engine malfunction shortly after takeoff from Miami International Airport (MIA).
- The incident occurred just a couple of minutes after departure, with the aircraft reaching a peak altitude of only 3,875 feet before circling back to MIA.
- The crew reported an engine fire and safely landed the plane, with no reported injuries.
An Atlas Air Boeing 747-8F, registered as N859GT, was forced to return to Miami International Airport (MIA) shortly after departure, with videos shared on social media showing the aircraft’s engine spewing flames, possibly indicating a compressor stall/surge.
Atlas Air cargo flight
The cargo aircraft was operating flight 5Y 95 from MIA to San Juan Luis Munoz Marin International Airport (SJU), Puerto Rico. The aircraft departed the Floridian airport at 22:32 local time (UTC -5), with its original scheduled departure time being 21:00, in accordance with Flightradar24 data.
Nevertheless, the aircraft encountered a difficulty shortly after departure since its peak flight altitude was only 3,875 feet (1,181 meters), with the aircraft immediately circling back to MIA. In total, after taking off at 22:32, the Boeing 747-8F was within the air for less than 13 minutes, landing on the airport at 22:45. The Atlas Air pilots never squawked 7700, which might have indicated a general emergency to Air Traffic Control (ATC).
ATC archives from LiveATC for MIA Departure South indicated that the Atlas Air Boeing 747-8F made a Mayday distress call, saying that they’d experienced When the controller asked the pilots whether or not they needed to burn fuel, the crew responded that they might be landing with their current fuel load, adding that there have been five souls and five hours’ value of fuel onboard the quad-engine aircraft.
The crew later told the departure controller that the number two engine, the inner power plant on the left-hand wing, was in trouble. In a press release to Easy Flying, an Atlas Air spokesperson confirmed the incident, saying that the Boeing 747-8F experienced an engine malfunction shortly after departing MIA.
Photo: Atlas Air
Meanwhile, listening to the ATC radio archive, provided by PTZtv, which has also arrange a camera alongside MIA’s runway 09/27, certainly one of the controllers on the airport was heard telling UPS flight 5X354, The controller added that the UPS Boeing 767F would find a way to depart MIA in about 10 minutes. The flight was initially scheduled to depart at 22:21, eventually departing MIA at 22:44.
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8-year-old Boeing 747-8F
In accordance with ch-aviation data, Boeing delivered the aircraft to Atlas Air in November 2015. The Boeing 747-8F is powered by 4 General Electric (GE) GEnx engines, the one engine family available to 747-8 aircraft family operators.
Photo: MKPhoto12 | Shutterstock
The positioning’s records also showed that the aircraft involved within the incident had gathered 34,780 flight hours (FH) and 5,684 flight cycles (FC) since delivery as of August 31, 2023. Since then, the airline has added a further 1,574.56 FHs and 239 FCs to the airframe and engines, per ch-aviation estimates.
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