US Airways Dividend Miles (Pre-FlightFund Merger) - US accident in PIT.

From The Morning Call -- June 14, 2004
US Airways plane falls off runway while taxiing

PITTSBURGH (AP) | -- A US Airways flight veered off a runway at Pittsburgh International Airport on Monday because a collision with a bird disabled the steering mechanism.

Flight 1076 from Charlotte, N.C., struck an owl after the aircraft landed, airport spokeswoman JoAnn Jenny said.

The aircraft, which had been taxiing, left the runway and became mired in mud around 3:30 a.m. The region had experienced some heavy storms early Monday morning.

The 92 passengers aboard had to be taken by bus to the terminal, where they waited several more hours for their luggage.

No one was injured, but a number of passengers complained that no one told them what had happened.

The flight had already been delayed in North Carolina because of storms.

The emphasis is mine.

Many times, I've landed and just sat on the runaway--never to learn exactly why we were "just sitting around."

Many times, I've landed and just sat on the runaway--never to learn exactly why we were "just sitting around."

If you're in PHL...usually either an aircraft is trying to depart out of a gate close to yours... or there aren't any certified ramp drivers for your airbus ;)

Then again...during any bad weather - the taxiways just look like a big parking lot.

-Chris

What's funny about this is that the TV station in PIT that broke this also did a story about a 400+ person deep line at PIT ticketing yesterday, with one (yes one) agent on duty.

Apparently, a riot almost started.

I'm hoping it's in the paper, but apparently (on the TV/radio report) they quoted a US spokesperson as saying something akin to "higher than normal numbers of people checking luggage and the lack of passengers 'educated' in kiosk use" were to blame. :rolleyes:

The plane struck an owl which screwed up the nosewheel steering, thus resulting in a trip into the mud.

...one (yes one) agent on duty...

...Enough said

plane landed at 330 am?!?!?!

I guess the bright side is this was a plane full of people US would have otherwise not put up overnight in hotels because of weather.

Even though they could have improved things by giving info, they still prevented a number of injuries. Good job.

I was on this flight from TPA-CLT. We landed in CLT at 2am Monday morning after lightning storms in Tampa delayed this plane coming in from PIT initially (diverted to PBI and MCO enroute to TPA). We were scheduled to leave around 7pm and took off around 12:30am. It was a 737-300.

It's good to hear that there were no injuries involved, other than to the unfortunate bird (some reports say an owl, I think the initial press release said a turkey).

Anyone know how badly the aircraft was damaged?