After news came out that a Southwest Airlines flight nearly plummeted into the Pacific Ocean off the coast of a Hawaiian Island more than two months after it happened, a federal investigation that was launched into the incident has gone public.
During this near-crash, the Boeing 737 Max 8 aircraft’s altitude dropped as low as 400 feet above the water before rapidly climbing again, according to tracking data from ADS-B Exchange.
The incident occurred April 11 on Southwest Flight 2786, but only became public after Bloomberg reported the airline sent a memo to pilots about what happened. The memo reportedly indicated a “newer” first officer was flying at the time and mistakenly pushed forward on the control column.
According to Bloomberg, the internal memo read the pilots decided to abort a landing there due to bad weather.
In December of 2022, a United Airlines flight departing a different Hawaiian airport also dove toward the ocean in poor weather conditions, coming down to 748 feet above the water, as reported by the National Transportation Safety Board.
In a brief statement to CNN, Southwest acknowledged the incident but did not address the memo or why the near-crash took place.
“Nothing is more important to Southwest than safety,” the airline’s statement read. “Through our robust Safety Management System, the event was addressed appropriately as we always strive for continuous improvement.”
The flight was an inter-island trip from the main Honolulu airport to Lihue airport on the neighboring island of Kauai.
Flight tracking data shows the plane dropping at a rate of more than 4,000 feet per minute while only 600 feet above sea level. The data also records that the plane returned to Honolulu after stabilizing.
The Federal Aviation Administration reported that it learned of the incident immediately and opened an investigation.
However, the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association has not publicly commented, and the NTSB has not yet said whether it will investigate the incident.
