Passengers on board Southwest Flight 4013 from Chicago to Branson Airport on Sunday evening were mistakenly deposited at M. Graham Clark Downtown Airport, several miles down the road, Telegraph informs.
While the plane landed safely, M. Graham Clark has a far shorter runway than Branson – 3,738 feet rather than 7,140 feet – and passengers claimed the aircraft came to a halt alarmingly close to the end of the tarmac. A spokesman for the airline confirmed that the two pilots on board – with 28 years of combined experience – had been suspended pending an investigation. The 124 passengers and five crew members were kept on board the Boeing 737-700 for around 75 minutes after landing. They were then taken to the correct airport by bus.
It was the second such incident in as many months involving US carriers – on November 20, an Atlas Air cargo jet landed at a municipal airport in Wichita, Kansas, instead of the McConnell Air Force Base.
“It’s a matter of a flight crew letting its guard down,” Earl Weener, a member of the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board who isn’t involved in the Branson investigation, said yesterday in an interview at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit. “It’s not unusual. I wish it were.”
