A major wind stom in Las Vegas kept planes from landing on Tuesday. American’s Chicago to Las Vegas flight 2254 made an unusal diversion – to Bullhead City, Arizona, an airport that lacks commercial service.
Las Vegas airport
With crew timing out, the flight cancelled. Checked bags were offloaded from the Airbus A321 and passengers could either wait for airline-provided buses to bring them to Las Vegas – or they could proceed on their own.
The wind storm is causing planes at Harry Reid Airport to abort their landings. pic.twitter.com/Z1cGziAv64
— Las Vegas Locally (@LasVegasLocally) July 1, 2025
Very odd diversion for AA Flight #2254 (ORD-LAS).
AA doesn’t operate at Bullhead City (IFP) and have no ground staff. IFP to LAS canceled. Crew timed out. What happened to the passengers? Dropped off in the middle of the desert? @xJonNYC @flightradar24 @garyleff pic.twitter.com/yX45Q5JBET
— June, June, Hannah. (@T0wanda) July 2, 2025
It was a disaster. We were eventually given our luggage once AA authorized Bullhead airport staff to unload. Told shuttle busses were coming from LV to pick us up but time unknown. Many of us pooled together and paid $100-$180/PP to get uber drivers to take us to LAS.
— Nick (@N1tchelous) July 2, 2025
Bullhead City, Arizona is 100 miles from Las Vegas, across the Colorado River from Laughlin, Nevada. But truthfully there aren’t going to be a lot of better options even flying a bit farther.
Credit: Laughlin/Bullhead Airport
Prescott Regional airport is going to be the closest to Laughlin offering commercial service, about 127 miles away and with United Express flights. The closest airport with American Eagle flights is going to be St. George, Utah, I think – perhaps 50 miles closer than Phoenix or Ontario.
American Airlines Airbus A321
The priority in a diversion is safety, considering available fuel resources and weather forecast. It’s always easier to land at an airport where the airline has service. When your own people are on the ground it’s going to be easier to assist passengers and coordinate with airport services. Under the circumstances though it doesn’t look reasonable to second guess the decision.
American Airlines Airbus A321
When a plane needs to get on the ground for fuel, outside the area where weather makes landing too much of a challenge, you’re going to have to pick from a limited range of options in this area. It’s unfortunate that crew were going to time out (the FAA and contractual agreements set maximum duty times which are considered safe). Here it seems the airline did the best it could for passengers – and they were in a place where they could organize things for themselves!
Frankly, there are many worse places to get stuck than Laughlin, Nevada.
@Jack the Ladd — Nope. You win!
Had the same problem back on May 18th this year. DFW to PSP.
The pilot wasn’t skilled enough to land in Palm Springs so he flew on to Ontario
and dumped everyone off close to midnight. No ground services at all. Got a Lift ride
to the desert for $200 but tight wad AA only reimbursed 1/2.
Where is Gary? Can’t you get rid of your repeat offenders here? You really support a forum of hate speech? Your comments have devolved away from your post so it’s time to remove the instigators.
I think a lot of people have actually heard of far worse “diversions” than this one, which seems pretty benign or at least expected with the weather, but oh we forget your anti-DEI crowd seem to think they can control the weather? Or should be able to in order to land the plane because they got all the answers given to them in flight school? Who the hell knows, I can’t follow that kind of “logic.”
That plane must’ve brought very minimal reserve fuel AND had circled on hold for some time to not be able to divert to somewhere better equipped for an A321
Why all of the long faces? Laughlin is cheaper! Free water taxi from the Bullhead side to Laughlin. Wait for a Vegas bus enjoying the casinos.
Palm Springs would have been a better choice. AA has service there and there are plenty of cheap hotels in a worst case scenario. American Airlines is now just Spirit Airlines and not even pretending.
Here comes Gary to Defend AA again. Regardless of anything this disaster of an Airline does, Gary always has a bright outlook for them. We dumped our customers off in the middle of the dessert with nothing, but hey, at least you landed wheels down..yay AA for a great landing. FFS, do you wake up with Rob Islom’s balls in your mouth?
Are you in such a hurry that you don’t proofread your articles? This is the second one in a row that had a typo in the first paragraph–and this has TWO in the first sentence.
“A major wind stom in Las Vegas kept planes from landing on Tuesday. American’s Chicago to Las Vegas flight 2254 made an unusal…”
Also, why do the pictures in your articles come across as HUGE in the email version? Frustrating to scroll, scroll, scroll past images that are huge to see the two sentences between them.
So, they kept you safe and now you’re mad? Idiots , stay the F home!
@JT$ — While some websites micromanage their comments, and others are such corporate shills that they literally can’t handle comments (TPG), I applaud Gary’s approach, which is to encourage free expression of diverse viewpoints, debate, and banter. Sure, some folks are overtly offensive, and others more covertly, but for the most part, it’s folks that enjoy the community, industry, and share their thoughts freely. I’ve repeatedly said, engage or ignore. Seeking to ‘ban’ others doesn’t usually end well. Slippery slope. Instead, call out those you disagree with, ideally on-substance. Bully the bullies. Troll the trolls. If you can’t handle the heat, get out of the kitchen!
“Frankly, there are many worse places to get stuck than Laughlin, Nevada.’
Frankly, there are few worse places. Have you ever been in that area in July? Waiting for non-existent staff to produce non-existent services in a god-forsaken backwater is not my idea of a fun holiday experience.
Weather forces planes to land in a different airports. Not the airlines fault. As a passenger I have logged over a million miles on AA and have been diverted to bad airports a few times. The worst part is when the airplane bathrooms become unusable while the captain waits for options. Sounds like theses passengers were at least able to get off the plane. Sh– happens. Stop whining. SMH
@TJH — And, what if… the ‘Sh– happens’ while ‘the airplane bathrooms become unusable’… see, now, that sounds like it might, just maybe, be worth ‘whining,’ doncha think? As former Speaker Pelosi once said, that’s a whole lotta ‘poo poo’ (on her desk/on that plane).
I will join those condemning Walter’s post. Floridly racist. I’m guessing that Walter is not in the industry. If he were, he would know that there is a general shortage of pilots and that the airlines are scrambling to fill cockpit seats. No competent, white male cis gender pilot is losing a job to a minority. There are plenty of jobs for both.
My question is whether AA loaded enough fuel given the weather situation. Airlines keep trying to save money by loading as little fuel as they possibly can. If the plane had a little more fuel, could it have diverted to an airport with available crew to fly the customers to Las Vegas.
Gary, in another post you asked why airlines are not more forthcoming about issues such as speed tape. Please refer to the quote by Allen posted below:
“Had the same problem back on May 18th this year. DFW to PSP.
The pilot wasn’t skilled enough to land in Palm Springs so he flew on to Ontario
and dumped everyone off close to midnight.”
Both the airline and the operating crew have to assume they will have at least some passengers as stupid as Allen onboard. Trying to explain anything of a technical nature causes more problems than is solves.
The choice of Bullhead City was probably due to a combination of the following:
* Fuel Remaining
* Wind Direction / Velocity
* Closest diversion airport for the planes location when diversion was made
* FAA / Air Traffic Control Guidance
* Safe to reach considering altitude and other operating conditions
REMEMBER, DIVERSION AND EMERGENCY LANDINGS ARE ABOUT GETTING THE PEOPLE DOWN SAFELY, NOT LUXURY OR AMENITIES AT THE LOCATION CHOSEN FOR THE LANDING. SOMETIMES THE DIVERSION OR EMERGENCY LANDING LOCATIONS ARE NOT FULL SERVICE COMMERCIAL AIRPORTS. INSTEAD THEY CAN INCLUDE:
* General Aviation / Charter / Executive Airports
* Military Base Airports
* Closed or Abandoned Airports
* Large Parking Lots, Highways, Open Fields, Abandoned Airports, and other similar setups can be used as a last resort for such landings if an airport is not available and one has to land fast.
DEI had nothing to do with this.
My worst diversion was a UA flight from SFO-DEN that diverted to BFF due to t-storms. There were no concessions at BFF except for a coke machine though thankfully passengers were permitted to deplane to use restrooms. My anxiety rose as this was a positioning flight for a DEN-FRA flight booked with miles.
Fortunately UA eventually received clearance to return to DEN, and our LH flight was delayed 3 hours by the same storm. But this is the reason I often do an overnight before TATL if I am booking a positioning flight.