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This week: Virgin’s failed celebrations delays flight & more

Wow, this was another full-on week of airport related news. But this week it seems the delays caused were mostly airline related:

Our first story sounds like an April’s fool joke. But it happened on 30 March. We’re talking about the Virgin Atlantic incident. According to the British newspaper The Mirror a landmark transatlantic flight was cancelled in farcical scenes after a ceremonial water cannon salute went horribly wrong and the jet was doused in thick foam. The salute was meant to mark the first Virgin Atlantic flight VA109 from Manchester (MAN) to Atlanta, Georgia, but excited passengers now face the night in a hotel after the flight was scrapped, the newspaper reported. The error meant the plane now had to undergo a thorough safety check to make sure the foam hadn’t damaged the jet engines or turbine blades. Travellers were delayed to the following day and put up in hotels.

Then it was Ryanair’s turn to “stuff up” as according to the BBC two Ryanair planes have scraped each other on the ground at Dublin airport (DUB). The winglet of one aircraft clipped the tail fin of the other as they were taxiing to the runway on Wednesday morning. Dublin Airport has said no one was injured and delays are expected to some departures:

A few days earlier another airlines made headlines. This time from the other side of the Atlantic: An Air Canada jet attempting to land at the Halifax international airport (YHZ) touched down about 1,100 feet before the runway, damaging the landing gear, ripping off the nose cone, mangling one wing and engine and ripping off the other before it skidded to a stop, ABC News reported. Twenty-five people on board the Air Canada A320 were injured in the hard landing after the jet hit an array antenna on the ground. Considering the considerable damage to the plane, it was fortunate that no one was seriously hurt, officials said. Subsequently, this incident lead to quite a few delays at the airport:

Moving on to more cheerful news. Remember our weekly news round-up that included that website covering the meaning behind airport codes? Well, now the Telegraph made a Quiz out of it. So go ahead and test your airport knowledge here.

That’s all for this week – safe travels!

[Photo Credit: markyharky via Compfight cc]