A British Airways Boeing 777 flight took off from London Gatwick Airport on Tuesday for San Jose in Costa Rica but didn't complete the trip. Five hours into the flight, the plane faced a technical issue and made a sharp U turn. It returned to London four hours later, spending nine hours in the air in total.
The journey from the UK to Costa Rica is 5,431 miles and usually takes 10 hours to complete the distance. However this flight returned back to London's Gatwick airport, nine hours after taking off.
Passengers took to X to reveal the reason behind the return. One of them said, "Flew halfway to Costa Rica and British Airways have decided to turn us around because apparently all of the water has leaked out of the aircraft."
Sure, it looks like Gatwick to SJO Costa Rica turned around and came back when it was almost there today, never seen that happen before!
— Barry Wilkinson (@itsbwfilm) October 30, 2024
"The mood was so bad on the plane when it became apparent we spent over 8 hours flying from Gatwick to Gatwick," she added.
This was not the first time that British Airways flyers have been on a flight to no destination.
In June, a Boeing 787s turned around after completing 2300 miles to Canada after a technical fault was detected in the flight.
British Airways Responds To the Incident
British Airways opened up on the incident and apologized for the inconvenience.
"We're sorry for the delay in our customers' travel plans after their aircraft experienced a minor technical issue," the airline told Business Insider.
"Our teams looked after our customers during the delay and worked hard to get them on their way as quickly as possible," the airline added.