Transcontinental flights are very much part and parcel of the modern commercial aviation industry in the United States of America, with both low-cost and legacy airlines doing their best to connect destinations on opposite sides of the vast country by air. Many of these operate every day, and most do so without incident. Recently, however, an American Airlines transcontinental flight took an eventful turn.
Specifically, when flying from San Francisco to Chicago, one of the Fort Worth-headquartered US ‘big three’ airline and oneworld founding member’s Boeing 737s developed an engine issue that forced its crew to shut it down in-flight. Following this course of action, it was decided that the best thing to do would be to divert the aircraft to Denver, where it remained on the ground for another two days.
Engine Issues Prompted The Diversion
Image: Flightradar24
American Airlines flight AA2556 is a regularly scheduled US domestic transcontinental flight that originates at San Francisco International Airport (SFO) in the north of the federal state of California. Its destination is Chicago O’Hare Airport (ORD) in Illinois, with data from Flightradar24 showing that American Airlines operates this flight on a daily basis. Normally, the flight departs at 14:40 local time.
With a scheduled arrival time of 21:01 into San Francisco, this gives the service a planned block time of four hours and 21 minutes. On June 15th, however, the flight took a lot longer. After leaving almost three hours late at 17:21, the Aviation Herald notes that the flight then diverted to Denver after declaring ‘Mayday’ due to an engine issue that required an in-flight shutdown. The choice of the Colorado airport as the diversion destination raised eyebrows on Reddit, with one user saying that:
“I’m kind of surprised they went to Denver. There was severe windshear there today, with at least one PIREP [pilot report of meteorological phenomena] for an insane 4000 feet per minute downdraft. I wouldn’t want to do a single-engine go around on a warm day in Denver.”
The Aircraft Remained On The Ground In Denver For Two Days
Photo: Vincenzo Pace | Simple Flying
According to the Aviation Herald, American Airlines flight AA2556, which was being operated by a Boeing 737-800 registered as N944AN on June 15th, was cruising at 39,000 feet 60 NM southeast of Denver when its crew requested to divert to the Mile-High City. The reason for this, it was later revealed, was that the pilots had observed evidence of an engine oil leak, which prompted them to shut it down.
Despite the aforementioned concerns by some commentators concerning the safety of landing in Denver under such conditions, the flight eventually landed safely on the 3,658-meter runway 16L at Denver International Airport (DEN) some 40 minutes later. By then, the local time was already 20:52, and reports from Reddit, including from a passenger on the flight, suggest that passengers were booked into hotels. Simple Flying has reached out to American Airlines for further information.
As for N944AN, the 737 that was operating American Airlines flight AA2556 on June 15th when it had to divert to Denver, the Aviation Herald reported that, upon landing, it was inspected by a mechanic, with physical damage to the engine having been found. It remained on the ground for two days, before repositioning to Tampa overnight on June 17th and reentering service flight a flight to Phoenix on the 18th.
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All About The Aircraft Involved
Photo: Vincenzo Pace | Simple Flying
Since reentering service with the aforementioned flight from Tampa to Phoenix on June 18th, N944AN has flown to San Francisco, Chicago, and Omaha. At the time of writing, it was, ironically, in the air operating a flight from Chicago O’Hare Airport back to San Francisco International, which, with any luck, will not have to divert to Denver in the same way that the reverse working did just four short days ago.
According to present fleet data made available by ch-aviation, N944AN is one of 303 units of the Boeing 737-800 that American Airlines currently has at its disposal, with this particular example being one of the oldest, at almost 25 years old.
Having been ordered by the US legacy carrier in November of 1996, it was delivered in August of 2000, and entered service with American Airlines the following month.
