Air India flight AI-822 had to return and make an emergency landing in Srinagar, India, on August 26th.
The Airbus A320-200 plane took off for Jammu, India, but had to turn back after the crew reported that they had not received a locked indication for the gear.
The plane landed back safely. All one hundred and forty-five people aboard remained unharmed.
A small plane made an emergency landing at Sarasota-Bradenton International Airport, Florida, on April 28th.
The plane was flying from Belize to Tampa, Florida, when the pilot declared an emergency reporting that the left main gear wheel was missing.
The plane landed safely. Chief Operating Officer of the Sarasota-Bradenton International Airport, Mark Stuckey, said, “Luckily when it did land, the aircraft did not catch fire, there were sparks but it safely skidded into the grass.”
There were four people aboard at the time; all of them remained unharmed.
Flybe flight BE-1284 crash-landed at Amsterdam Airport, Netherlands, on February 23rd.
The plane was coming from Edinburgh, Scotland, when its right main gear collapsed during landing.
There were 59 people aboard at the time; all of them remained safe.
The aircraft suffered significant damage.
SkyWest Airlines flight OO-3079 had to return and make an emergency landing in Chicago, Illinois, on February 18th.
The plane took off for Salt Lake City, Utah, but had to return shortly afterwards after the crew failed to retract landing gear. The plane landed back safely.
All passengers and crew members remained unharmed.
The airline arranged a replacement plane for the passengers.
Wings Abadi flight IW-1896 veered off the runway at Achmad Yani International Airport, Semarang, Central Java, Indonesia, on December 25th.
The Avions de Transport Regional ATR-72-212A flying from Bandung landed safely on the runway but veered off and came to a stop with its right main gear collapsed.
The aircraft received substantial damage.
No injuries were reported.
TAROM Airlines flight RO-637 had to return and make an emergency landing in Otopeni, Romania, on October 13th.
The plane took off for Satu Mare, Romania, but had to return shortly afterwards after its gear failed to fully retract.
The plane landed safely. All 33 people aboard remained unharmed.
Malaysia Airlines flight MH-2665 had to divert and make an emergency landing in Kuching, Malaysia, on September 20th.
The Boeing 737-800 plane flying from Tawau to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, was diverted after the crew received an abnormal gear indication.
The plane landed safely. Everyone aboard remained unhurt.
Air Wisconsin flight ZW-4047/AA-4047 had to return and make an emergency landing at Manchester Airport, Manchester, UK, on July 19th.
The Canadair CRJ-200 en-route to Pennsylvania had to return due to a gear issue.
The plane landed safely.
No injuries were reported.
Azul Brazilian Airlines flight AD-5176 had to return and make an emergency landing in Sao Paulo, Brazil, on May 25th.
The plane took off for Tras Lagoas, Brazil, but had to return shortly afterwards after the crew reported strange noises during gear retraction.
The plane landed uneventfully. Everyone aboard remained unharmed.
Jetairfly flight TB-705 had to return and make an emergency landing at Brussels Airport, Brussels, Belgium, on May 1st.
The Boeing 787-800, en-route to Cancun, Mexico, had to return shortly after the crew reported some problem with its gear. It later turned out that there was a flap retraction issue.
The plane landed uneventfully. All passengers aboard remained unharmed.
The passengers were accommodated in a replacement plane.
JetBlue flight B6-29 had to make an emergency landing at Lynden Pindling International Airport, Nassau, Bahamas on March 25.
The Embraer ERJ, en-route from Washington, DC to Nassau, Bahamas was on approach to runway when the crew reported that the nose gear was inoperable, went around for a while and upon failing to retract the gear, attempted for a landing.
The plane landed successfully.
All 95 people aboard remained unharmed.
Malmo Aviation flight TF-9887 had to return for a safe landing at Cologne Bonn Airport, Cologne, North Rhine- Westphalia, Germany on February 13.
The Avro RJ-100, heading from Cologne to Malmo, Sweden, was mid-air when the crew reported some problem with its gear, causing it to return.
The plane landed safely.
All people aboard remained unhurt.
Asiana Airlines flight OZ-116 made a hard landing at Kansai International Airport, Osaka, Japan, on December 1.
The Boeing 767-300, flying from Seoul, South Korea, was about to land when he crew noticed an indication of some issue with its left side main gear.
The plane landed safely.
All 149 people aboard remained unhurt.
What: Shaheen Air International Boeing 737-400 en route from Islamabad to Karachi
Where: Karachi
When: Apr 22nd 2012
Who: 122 passengers and 6 crew
Why: On landing in Karachi, the main gear failed, and the gear perforated the wing.
Passengers disembarked on to the runway. No injuries were reported.
If we were to speculate (which we shouldn’t do) we would say this could be either due to a hard or fast landing and/or a mechanical failure.
The first flight of this Boeing 737-4H6 was Sept 21, 1993. On October 28 1993, the plane was delivered to Malaysia Airlines as 9M-MQC. It was stored 09/2011 as N829AR (Bank of Utah) and delivered to Shaheen Air on January 21, 2012.
Click to view full size photo at Airliners.net
Contact photographer Xu Zheng
What: China Eastern Yunnan Airlines Canadair CRJ-200 en route from Nanning China to Yangon Myanmar
Where: Kumming China
When: Nov 5th 2011
Why: Just after takeoff, the crew observed problems with the main gears.
The flight diverted to China Eastern Yunnan’s base in Kunming China where they made a safe landing.
Click to view full size photo at Airliners.net
Contact photographer powwwiii
What: LOT Polish Airlines Boeing 767-300 en route from Newark,NJ (USA) to Warsaw (Poland) with 220 passengers and 11 crew
Where: Warsaw
When: Nov 1st 2011
Who: 220 passengers and 11 crew
Why: On the first approach to Warsaw, the flight crew aborted the approach. They had gotten an unsafe gear indication for the three gear struts. They spent over an hour trying to amend the problem, but efforts to lower the gear failed, and the failure was confirmed by a visual fly by.
Captain Tadeusz Wrona and First Officer Jerzy Szwarc then nailed a gear up landing, landing on the Boeing’s belly and skidding to a stop. The runway was foamed beforehand to lower potential fire damage.
Below, you can see that a US Airport like Indianapolis (with its “beastmaster”) would handle the flight differently. There is always controversy about landing on a foam-slick runway.
Click to view full size photo at Airliners.net
Contact photographer Peter Tsagaris
What: Trans States Airlines Embraer ERJ-145/United Airlines en route from Chicago to Ottawa
Where: Ottawa International Airport
When: Sep. 04 2011
Who: 44 passengers, 3 crew
Why: On landing in Ottawa, the plane slid, and veered off the side of the runway, with collapsed main gear struts.
On Apr 28th 2011, an Embraer ERJ-145 landed in Moscow with collapsed main gear.
Last year, another plane with the same airline also skidded off the runway into soft ground.
Sunday’s passengers describe coming down from a dark cloud to land in rain.
The landing is under investigation.
I do not know if this runway is incorrectly graded for drainage, or if the ERJ-145 has a special problem with main gear struts or struts in hard landings.
I do know I fly 100,000 miles on United in order to keep my status as a 1K member.
I do not know if the maintenance of the aircraft is as terrible as the typical maintenance of United plane interiors. If so, then we have huge problems. The refurbished planes of two years ago already look worn out. The galleys are grimy looking the toilets are terrible.
I could say bad things about the food, the lav hot water is not hot enough to meet standards required by most states for food workers, (where I have never seen Waterless Hand Sanitizers and for sure, NEVER have seen a food preparer or server wear gloves.)
Is United maintenance absolutely out of control? Maybe this stretches to other airlines, economizing on staff and maintenance due to the times.
I fly Delta, American, Virgin, they have some of the same issues, but, I see these problems in the United flights, no matter which direction I am headed.
Who knows yet if this incident is runway or plane, pilot training or just an old plane that needs better maintenance. But whatever truths the investigation reveals, the fact remains that no one steps up to the plate until something bad happens.