A United Airlines flight lost a wheel on take-off in San Francisco on Thursday morning. The wheel fell to the ground, damaging several cars in the process, with the plane diverted and later making a safe emergency landing.
The flight in question was United Flight 35. The Boeing 777 took off from San Francisco International Airport (SFO) bound for Kansai International Airport in Osaka, Japan. The take-off was captured on a live stream by YouTube channel Cali Planes. In the video, an object can be seen falling from the inside of the left rear landing gear.
With the plane leaving from runway 28R at SFO, the wheel plummeted to the ground into a staff parking lot. It landed on a fence and several vehicles, causing significant damage, before bouncing into an adjoining lot for rental cars. As covered by NBC Bay Area, staff in the area heard a loud crunch as the wheel smashed into vehicles on the ground. Thankfully, nobody was injured in the incident, with the lot largely free of pedestrians at the time.
The incident can be seen when the above livestream’s ticker reads 11:24:20 AM.
One silver sedan took the brunt of the damage, with an adjacent chain-link fence also receiving a heavy hit from the wheel. Some reports suggest a red Tesla Model 3 may have also been hit by the wheel as it bounced across two parking lots.
The plane was diverted to Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) rather than continuing on to Japan. The Boeing 777 has six wheels on each of its main landing gear, and modern airliners can safely land even with some damaged or missing wheels. The plane was able to make a safe emergency in Los Angeles shortly after 1:30 PM. Generally, in a situation where parts have fallen from the airline, it makes sense to land the plane rather than continue on a long international flight, out of an abundance of caution.
— Julian (@Aviationmech123) March 7, 2024
Julian, aka @Aviationmech123 on Twitter, captured the above video of the damage caused by the wheel. To some degree, it’s almost a surprise the incident wasn’t worse. For context, a tire from the main landing gear of a Boeing 777-200 weighs a full 265 pounds, according to Air Canada. Measuring 51 inches high and 21 inches wide, the tires are typically inflated to a pressure of 218 PSI. Changing the tires is normally handled by a small crew of technicians, as you can see in this video from the airline.
After the incident, authorities secured the wheel that fell off the plane. Contrary to some reports, it was not just a tire that fell from the aircraft. Shots taken by NBC’s aerial unit clearly show the whole wheel fell off the plane.
At this stage, it’s entirely unclear what may have caused the wheel to fall from the plane. Photographs of the wheel and plane itself are limited at this time, so we can only broadly speculate.
One thing my engineering brain picks up from these images? It’s the light-colored area visible in the center of the wheel that we see lying on the ground. It’s jagged and much lighter than the surrounding metal, which makes it look like a fracture surface. It suggests perhaps part of the wheel or hub broke off, sending it tumbling to the ground. However, these images are not clear enough to know for certain, and it could simply be a lighter-colored part of the hub assembly that we’re looking at.
It’s another ugly incident that has put a Boeing plane smack-bang in the middle of the headlines once again. It’s worth noting, though, that any fresh enmity for the Seattle company may be misdirected. The plane in question, a Boeing 777-200, was first delivered to United a full 22 years ago.
Just as you wouldn’t blame Ford if you had a wheel fall off your 2001 Taurus, Boeing may not be at fault in this case. It’s perhaps more likely that a maintenance error occurred with the fitting of the wheel or tires. This would usually be handled in-house by an airline’s own maintenance crews.
UPDATE: The tire that fell off a United Airlines plane after takeoff from SFO landed in an airport parking lot and appeared to damage multiple cars. https://t.co/HJ3vDMLaYO pic.twitter.com/EiEYEpN0er
— NBC Bay Area (@nbcbayarea) March 7, 2024
In any case, neither airlines, manufacturers, nor the general public appreciate aircraft parts falling from the sky. The NHTSB will be investigating the matter in detail to determine what happened and we should find out in due course.
Image credits: NBC Bay Area via YouTube/Twitter screenshot, @AviationMech123 via Twitter screenshot
I wonder: Is it still a United flight if something falls off?
I find it absolutely hilarious how the plane was being filmed by someone who clearly had manual control of the camera and was tracking the plane and they did not for a moment even consider to film where the falling wheel was going. There would probably have been some buildings in the way of a view of the impact, but still, that is pure and utter love of plane takeoffs.
Wasn’t this one built so the wheel wouldn’t fall off?
Well, obviously not.
Hey United maintenance techs, it says it right on the check list: “righty tighty, lefty loosey”.
Well, the righty wheel assembly sure seemed a lot more tighty and less loosey than the left.
I’m going to fly this plane until the wheels fall off.
I bet the white part is the damaged seal for the internal bearing, likely plastic or Teflon. My guess is this was a fastener issue, the retaining nut fell off.
This is a great illustration for physics students worldwide:
For American high school students: calculate the landing position of the wheel. Disregard air resistance
For Chinese pre-K students: calculate the landing position of the wheel. Assume Cd=0.5, surface roughness factor of 1.5, and initial spin velocity of 500rpm
I’m reminded of The Simpsons episode from the future when Maggie flies back to the states on a Mad-Max-style “airliner”.
San Francisco is still using P71s? I didn’t think any major police force would have them in service today.
In a previous comment section regarding P71s, the commentariat shared some San Diego one, too, as the oldest in their fleet. Both a point of pride and “if it ain’t broke” attitude, which I can appreciate.
Certainly not something I see in PA, but there’s the whole “rust” issue here.
At the Chicago-area muni I work for, our last Vic went to auction just a couple of years ago. After the PD wrote it off, it spend almost a decade as a rarely-used public works errand-runner. It wasn’t a rusty body or frame that was the issue, it was just plain wore out.
I still see LA Vics when I vist
I guess that’s what low guy on the totem pole gets. The guy that has to tie ribbon around junk in the street.
The LA county sheriffs still have them around.
A month or so ago I was watching a police chase video stitched together from the dashcams of the officers and deputies involved. This was somewhere in Wisconsin, I want to say in the Kenosha area. 8 deputies and police officers in Explorer SUV’s, 1 lone deputy in an old Crown Vic, and the suspect was in a stolen Audi. The chase was occurring on surface streets, and the suspect was giving it full send. The Crown Vic ended up having to take the lead because the Explorers were too clumsy to keep up with all the turns. They ended up staying on the dude’s tail for about 15 minutes before the suspect made a mistake and plowed into a signal pole.
They do still have their place.
One would think the multitude of LX and LD Charger Pursuits would still stick around compared to the Crown Victoria P71s, but apparently the LX Pursuits are horrible to stay inside for long periods of time and the LDs have fragile transmissions (though is the Explorer Interceptor any better in that regard?) and are expensive to repair. I’ve seen more dead LDs on GovDeals than I’ve seen around stations in the past five years. Seemingly everybody yeeted the Taurus Interceptors the moment they were able to because of how cramped they were, and with the Caprice PPV technically not being road legal and parts being a bitch to get most of those were crushed.
Considering you can get reproduction or brand new OEM parts for the SN-95/New Edge Mustang and tenth and eleventh gen F-150/Explorer that fit the Crown Victoria and how many were made and could be cannibalized it’s no wonder there’s still a few around.
I’ve turned wrenches on 777’s but I’m much more familiar with A320’s. I think that cleaner area is either part of the hubcap or where the hubcap sat. Typically you torque and loosen the nut a few times to seat the bearings and brakes. Could be they just forgot to do the final torque, but even then the safety bolts should have caught it. Either way, this is likely just human error and not Boeings fault.
If it’s Boeing I’m not going.
That broken jagged bit is what is left of the hub-bearing cap. I would guess the castellated bearing nut was improperly safetied and backed off.
Aircraft wheels have an integral hub and are secured by the wheel bearings.
That is the front of the wheel; the back has big lugs that engage the brake discs.
Years ago, there were some problems with the black-water tanks on airplanes: at high altitudes/low pressure, the effluent could be sucked out, whereupon it would freeze to the skin of the plane. When enough built up, it could break free and fall to the ground. Happening at a time that Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles were in the news, some wag noted that we were all under threat of icy BMs
Boooo!!
BOOOOOOO!!!
I see COTD is starting early today… LOL
I DO apologize!
not mine: believe I saw it in Analog Science Fiction magazine
and my mind goes places @ 5 am… I was just sharing
The Toyota Corolla is such an OP vehicle that it needs an airplane wheel (with tire attached) to land on it to put a dent in its reliability.
That’s Toyota Tough.
Sure, aircraft are “designed” to land without one or two wheels. I can make any plane land without any wheels at all!
But doing it more than once? Eh….
Look into the Navy’s “rubber carriers”. An interesting dead end at the beginning of the Jet Age.
Well, at least the front half of the boat didn’t fall off.
As long as it’s outside the environment when it happens.
I’m sure all required maintenance checks and service were fully performed and documented. /s
Aircraft maintenance is no joke. Tons of double checks, tool checks, and approval paperwork. They’ll be able to track down whoever has tightened the wheel bolts, where the bolts were from, and when they were last torqued with what torque wrench.
And yet shit happens.
As my teacher used to say, “Only Jesus is perfect”
I’m not joking. I’m dripping wet with sarcasm. That’s exactly my point. It is no joke and there are tons of procedures that are supposed to be followed in an ideal world. However, we live in the era of shareholder value and so as Col Lingus says, shit happens. I’ll state simply that I don’t believe all procedures we followed exactly and that’s why this happened.
If you truly believe all airline/aircraft procedures and rules are precisely followed at all times by everyone, then I have a door plug to sell you at a great price. /s
I could go on and on. From improper jacking of engines when mounting, to bad chemical oxygen generators, to bolts being fully left the fuck out, to eyeball maintenance checks, the list just goes on. I sincerely suggest you check out the show Airline Disasters. Underpaid, overworked, personal problem having employees don’t always do everything right.
Finally, I lived near the mobile home park where some DC-10 fell into near O’hare after dropping an engine after takeoff. I have flown less than ten times in my life and am totally okay with that.
The problem with the door plug is that it was installed by a Boeing contractor, not a maintenance technician, at leas that’s my understanding of the issue.
“Airline Disasters” and other TV shows are a great example of confirmation bias of fear of flight. Thousands of flights occur every week yet the show is now down to private and hobbyist failures. Most airline rules and regulations are written in blood, there is no denying that. However, we’ve learned significantly over the years how and why these things happened and that has lead to more safety and oversight with aircraft repair and maintenance.
Take for instance the “fake bolt” problem that the FAA has been fighting for years. At one point in time you could order an OEM part from a supplier, only to get a fake bolt that hadn’t been tested to OEM specs. They are still floating around out there, but the FAA has worked to reduce and remove the problem entirely with more source tracking of each part. This significantly increases the costs of the part, but it holds the manufacturer and repairing team responsible for any faults of that part.
While I agree that this doesn’t look like one of Boeing’s “quality escapes”, the timing couldn’t be worse. No one would pay any attention to the plane maker a few years ago, but now Boeing is the company that forgets screws on doors…
In any case, thank you Lewin for not joining the bandwagon and providing all the facts.
The old joke finally happens IRL.
“What sound does it make when a part falls off a plane?”
“Boeing.”
Enjoy the buffet. Tip the staff.
out of an abundance of caution.
And a paucity of wheels.
Sounds like something that would happen in Newark LOL
Yeah, especially if they were DONKS
Airplane tires have a hard life and it’s not rare that one blows up especially on landing.
What is more rare is the whole wheel falling off…
Honestly I’m kinda impressed that silver corolla held up that well!
i don’t get out enough because I did not pick that was a ‘rolla
I think there are way more silver Hyundais out here so I was like “Is that an Elantra, no….”
Someone will be getting a new Corolla… with custom Roo bars across the roof and back.
Apparently fatigue was a contributing factor: the wheel was tired.
Boeing must be treading new ground in measuring the space where the rubber meets the road…
HA
Wheely tired!
Damn mechanic didn’t do enough ugah dugahs.
or too many ugga duggas <__<
Someone clearly didn’t kick it and go “that’s not going anywhere.”
should be on the SOP.