Maintenance personnel at Yeager Airport exit the portable stairway connected to the entryway of a United Airlines Boeing 757 that made an emergency landing at the Charleston airport on Tuesday.
CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- Passengers aboard a San Diego-bound United Airlines flight from Washington's Dulles International Airport spent an unexpected four-hour layover at Charleston's Yeager Airport on Tuesday, after smoke was detected in their westbound Boeing 757.
Emergency crews were on hand, and the access road to the airport was temporarily closed to accommodate emergency vehicles, as the aircraft made a routine landing at about 9:15 a.m. None of the 178 passengers and crew members aboard the flight was injured in the incident.
"I slept through everything until I felt that we were landing," said Matthew Pendergraft, a former San Diego resident now living in Buenos Aires, Argentina, as he waited for news about the continuation of his trip in Yeager's passenger terminal.
Pendergraft said the first clue he had that something was amiss took place when he opened his window shade shortly after the aircraft touched down. "I saw right away that we weren't at the San Diego airport," he said.
While initial reports cited smoke in the cockpit as the reason for United Flight 229 diverting to Charleston, passenger Glen Yelich of Rensselaerville, N.Y., said an intercom message from the flight deck told passengers that a restroom smoke detector had been activated.
When the source of the smoke could not immediately be found, a decision was made to divert to Yeager as a precaution.
"Some people said they could detect the odor of smoke, but I couldn't," said Yelich, who was headed to San Diego for a family vacation with his wife, Linda Sue, daughter, Stella, and son, Silas.
CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- Passengers aboard a San Diego-bound United Airlines flight from Washington's Dulles International Airport spent an unexpected four-hour layover at Charleston's Yeager Airport on Tuesday, after smoke was detected in their westbound Boeing 757.
Emergency crews were on hand, and the access road to the airport was temporarily closed to accommodate emergency vehicles, as the aircraft made a routine landing at about 9:15 a.m. None of the 178 passengers and crew members aboard the flight was injured in the incident.
"I slept through everything until I felt that we were landing," said Matthew Pendergraft, a former San Diego resident now living in Buenos Aires, Argentina, as he waited for news about the continuation of his trip in Yeager's passenger terminal.
Pendergraft said the first clue he had that something was amiss took place when he opened his window shade shortly after the aircraft touched down. "I saw right away that we weren't at the San Diego airport," he said.
While initial reports cited smoke in the cockpit as the reason for United Flight 229 diverting to Charleston, passenger Glen Yelich of Rensselaerville, N.Y., said an intercom message from the flight deck told passengers that a restroom smoke detector had been activated.
When the source of the smoke could not immediately be found, a decision was made to divert to Yeager as a precaution.
"Some people said they could detect the odor of smoke, but I couldn't," said Yelich, who was headed to San Diego for a family vacation with his wife, Linda Sue, daughter, Stella, and son, Silas.
"It's just adding another stop to our vacation," Yelich said with a shrug, as he and his family ate breakfast in the airport's Tudor's restaurant. "I listen to Mountain Stage," he said, "but we've never been to West Virginia before."
United sent another Boeing 757 to Yeager to carry the westbound passengers to Chicago, where they would make other connections to reach San Diego. That aircraft departed Yeager about 1:30 p.m.
Airport officials said the emergency landing did not delay or interrupt the day's commercial flight schedule.
While the United 757 is larger than the commercial aircraft that normally serve the Charleston market, Yeager has no difficulty accommodating aircraft of its size, according to airport officials.
A Boeing 757 version of Air Force One, the presidential aircraft, has landed at Yeager numerous times during the past decade. During memorial services for Sen. Robert C. Byrd earlier this month, the 757 versions of both the presidential and vice presidential aircraft -- Air Force One and Air Force Two -- were used to shuttle dignitaries to Charleston.
Federal aviation officials on Tuesday began looking into the source of the smoke that prompted the emergency landing.
"So far, we've heard nothing about a possible cause," said Yeager's marketing director, Bryan Belcher.
Reach Rick Steelhammer at rsteelham...@wvgazette.com or 304-348-5169.
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