A Southwest plane en route to Cancun, Mexico managed to make a safe landing after flames were seen shooting out of its right wing.
The incident was caught on video after Tuesday’s flight took off from William P. Hobby Airport in Houston, Texas. A spokesperson for the airline shared in an emailed statement to FOX Business on Thursday morning that the flight, identified as Southwest Flight #307, “returned to the airport on Tuesday night after experiencing a mechanical issue shortly after takeoff.”
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“The aircraft landed safely and was taken out of service for review,” the airline added in its statement. “A different aircraft continued the flight to Cancun last evening, and we appreciate our customers’ patience and support.” The airline did not immediately respond to PEOPLE’s request for comment.
The video showed the flight flying over a cloudy sky when the unexpected sight began to occur. A passenger on the plane shared with CBS affiliate KHOU that the plane began to swing left and right during the incident.
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“I think I fly once or twice a month, and I knew that wasn’t normal, and so I opened up my window, and I’m sitting next to the engine, and that whole engine you see like fireballs coming out of it,” shared Coale Kalisek, who said he was heading to travel hotspot on vacation with his girlfriend.
Fellow passenger Jordan Kleinecke spoke out about the incident, telling ABC News: “We felt like a little air pocket going up. And then I heard the boom … and then you started smelling the fuel.”
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Passenger Lynde Kleinecke added: “When the pilot came on and told us [that] we were going back [to the airport], he hardly finished that statement before he hung up the microphone. We were kind of like, ‘What does that mean? What does that mean?’ ”
In March, a similar incident occurred when a Southwest Airlines flight bound for Fort Lauderdale, Florida was forced to circle back to Cuba when a bird strike caused the cabin to fill with smoke.
“The pilots safely returned to Havana where the 147 customers and six crew evacuated the aircraft via slides due to smoke in the cabin,” a spokesperson shared with PEOPLE in a statement about the incident. “The customers and crew were bussed to the terminal and are being accommodated on alternative flights to Fort Lauderdale.”
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