Passengers on a crowded Emirates flight powered by the flagship Airbus A380 had to endure a 14-hour flight to nowhere. Their plane bound for New Zealand was forced to turn around mid-flight. The reason was flooding at the Auckland airport, because of which he suspended all operations.
Emirates Flight EK448 took off from Dubai just before 11:00 am last Friday, but almost halfway to Auckland – a 15-and-a-half-hour flight – the pilots of the double-deck Superjumbo made the difficult decision to turn around and head straight back to Dubai.
Severe weather and heavy rains caused significant damage throughout Auckland on Friday, with flood waters hitting the city’s airport particularly hard. Pictures on social media show passengers wading through knee-deep flood water inside the terminal building after the airport was flooded with rain. Under the water were the terminal building, the runway, and the taxiways.
Auckland Airport, already suffering from significant delays caused by a previous crash in which a plane damaged the landing lights at the end of the runway, was forced to entirely suspend all departures and arrivals due to the rampant elements.
An airport spokesman said the international terminal’s check-in and arrivals areas were the hardest hit by flooding and warned passengers that activities would not resume anytime soon.
Air New Zealand urged customers not to attempt to reach Auckland Airport while the flag carrier’s ultra-long-haul flights scheduled to arrive in Auckland were diverted to Christchurch instead.
For passengers on Dubai flight EK448, changing to Christchurch was not an option and instead, the plane turned around and headed back to the United Arab Emirates.
The airline said the decision was made to return to Dubai to “wait for weather conditions to improve”. An Emirates spokesman said the airline has “apologized for all the inconvenience” caused by the epic flight to nowhere.
Passengers on American Airlines Flight AA35 from Dallas to Fort Worth to Oakland also experienced a 10-hour flight to nowhere after their plane made a similar mid-flight maneuver and returned to the US.