Video: Plane Carrying US Basketball Team Lands Safely After Engine Emits Flames

A SwiftAir 737 flight carrying the Kansas Jayhawks basketball team over the weekend was forced to make an emergency landing at California’s Mineta San Jose International Airport after the plane encountered serious engine problems.

Cellphone footage recorded by Ryan White, the senior associate athletic director of the Kansas University (KU) team, was shared on Twitter and showed flames shooting out of the plane’s left side engine.

The worrying Sunday incident unfolded just 20 minutes into the flight.

​“There was this weird noise, just a little bit of a rattle,” Dan Beckler, the spokesperson for the KU Athletic Department, told the Kansas City Star of the moments after the engine began sputtering out. 

From that moment, it wasn’t much longer before the flight crew informed those aboard the plane that the aircraft had lost an engine, and that the plane would be making an emergency landing in San Jose.

The basketball team was later retrieved by bus from the airport at roughly 7 p.m. local time and transported to a nearby hotel. The athletics department later issued a statement on the matter, explaining that the team would be staying the night in San Jose until returns plans to Lawrence, Kansas, were finalized.

“We are grateful to the pilots and the entire flight crew of Swift Air,” the release added.

​The flight mishap took place hours after the Kansas Jayhawks basketball team beat the Stanford Cardinals 72-56. The Kansas team’s next match is due to take place on January 4, and will be against the West Virginia Mountaineers.

Sourse: sputniknews.com