On New Years Eve, Star Alliance member Avianca’s flight AV29 took off from Orlando headed to Bogota, Colombia. And as the Airbus A319 touched down it “collided with a large plastics object floating in the air” which became tangled across both the left and ride side engines, wings and horizontal stabilizers.
🚨#ÚLTIMAHORA La irresponsabilidad de unos desadaptados estuvo a punto de causar una tragedia. Hace momentos un Airbus A320 (N557AV) de Avianca impactó un globo pirotécnico cuando aproximaba a Bogotá procedente de Orlando, obligándole a aterrizar de emergencia. pic.twitter.com/cELiXagAUO
— Webinfomil.com (@Webinfomil) January 1, 2021
According to Avianca,
The flight of Dec 31st 2020 covering the Orlando-Bogota route was reached by a hot air balloon when it had already landed at El Dorado Airport. The flight landed at 20:09 local time with all its passengers and crew in perfect condition and was towed at 20:59, following an inspection by the fire brigade in which no news was reported.
Passengers who had connections to other destinations were able to do so without any inconvenience. Avianca makes a call to the public to refrain from burning such balloons, which are prohibited by authorities.
The Aviation Herald points out that Parque La Florida is about 1.5 miles from the start of runway 13L where the Airbus aircraft landed, and the site of New Years Celebrations.
Fortunately the aircraft wasn’t damaged, and the crew didn’t need to declare an emergency after hitting a balloon which, according to Colombia’s Aerocivil agency, was “made of paper, plastics and some parts of aluminum.” However, as of this writing, the A319 appears not to have left Bogota since this landing.
This is super vague for anyone who doesn’t know a thing about Florida, Colombia, or anything much in between.
After re-reading a few times now I see that this did NOT happen in US Airspace at all. The “event” happened entirely inside of Colombia. Parque La Florida is, in fact, not in Florida, but in Colombia. And the fact that the flight took off from Orlando is of 0 consequence, as it landed at its destination – in Colombia.
When will idiots stop taking videos in portrait mode?
Gary Leff, needs to take a remedial geography and a creative writing course…
Desadaptados is such a GREAT slur in Spanish
PEOPLE! STOP POINTING FINGERS, ESTABLISHING NINCOMPOOP GEOGRAPHICAL LINES OF RESPONSIBILITIES, SUSPECT WORDS OF DOUBLE ENTENDRE AND TRY SOMETHING VERY UNIQUE! LET’S SOLVE THE PROBLEM! MAYBE NOT FLY DURING CULTURAL CELEBRATIONS THAT USE DEVICES WHICH COULD BRING DOWN A COMMERCIAL AIRLINER KILLING ALL 400+ PEOPLE ON BOARD. ALL YOUR ARGUMENTS BECOME WORTHLESS AT THE FUNERALS WHERE WE ALL OF A SUDDEN HAVE TO BURY 400+ OTHERWISE HEALTHY PEOPLE INCLUDING THOSE ON THE GROUND! WORK THE PROBLEM PEOPLE! SOLVE IT! CELEBRATE LIFE BY MAKING GOOD DECISIONS SOLVING THE PROBLEMS IN OUR LIVES! OR…YOU CAN BUY CASKETS AND FLOWERS…CHOOSE!