A U.S. flight took a terrifying dive, plummeting to merely 800 feet above the Pacific Ocean shortly after taking off from Maui last year, according to flight data.
The drop occurred just 71 seconds after United Airlines Flight UA 1722 took off from Kahului Airport in Maui bound for San Francisco on December 18, according to Flight Radar, a flight tracking website. The dive was first reported by The Air Current.
The plane took off at 2: 49 p.m. local time and climbed to an altitude of 2,200 feet when it suddenly took a dive and dropped to 775 feet over the Pacific Ocean.
The data shows that the plane's vertical rate was nearly 8,600 feet per minute.
The dive and recovery took less than a minute, and the flight recovered and regained an altitude of 2,350 feet.
The plane had taken off as Hawaii was experiencing stormy weather with showers and thunderstorms rolling across the region, according to the National Weather Service office in Honolulu. On December 18, Maui was under flash flood warnings, high surf and gale warnings.
The flight continued on its journey and arrived in San Francisco at 9: 03 p.m. local time.
After landing at SFO, the pilots filed the appropriate safety report. It said that the pilots received additional training as a result of a joint investigation with the Federal Aviation Administration and the Air Line Pilots Association.
Safety remains our highest priority, the airline said in a statement.
The two pilots involved, who have about 25,000 hours of flying experience between them, fully cooperated with the investigation and their training program is ongoing, according to the airline. It didn't give any further information on the incident.
The FAA said the flight crew reported the incident to it as part of a voluntary safety reporting program and that the agency took appropriate action and that they were part of a voluntary safety reporting program.