What: Windjet Airbus A320-200 en route from Catania to Rome Fiumicino (Italy)
Where: Catania
When: May 4th 2009
Who: 111 passengers
Why: This plane returned to Catiana not once but twice. First, an unsafe gear indication turned them back for repairs; on the second try, retraction of the gears resulted in vibrations of the airframe, so they returned to Catiana a second time. The flight left for Rome seven hours later–on a different plane.

George’s Point of View

Can’t you just feel the response of the passengers? Not just the anxiety the first time around, but imagine the second attempt when those gears went up and that anxiety was topped off by terror when the plane started vibrating. There’s not a person on board that plane who wasn’t relieved when that plane made it safely to the runway.