This is the moment flames shoot from the back of a Boeing 747-400 forcing the jet to make an emergency landing in Indonesia in the latest troubling incident for the plane-making giant.
Frightening footage shows a streak of orange flames shooting out of the engine just as the plane takes to the air.
The Garuda Indonesia flight took off from Makassar, Indonesia, bound for Medina in Saudi Arabia on May 15.
The aircraft immediately returned to the Sultan Hasanuddin International Airport after ‘fire was observed in one of the engines’, an airline spokesperson said. No injuries were reported.
The Boeing 747-400 aircraft had 18 crew members and 450 passengers on board.
The terrifying incident comes after a string of Boeing aircraft failures in recent months as well as the sudden deaths of two whistleblowers speaking out against the plane manufacturer.
Frightening footage shows a streak of orange flames shooting out of the engine just as the plane takes to the air
The Garuda Indonesia flight took off from Makassar, Indonesia, bound for Medina in Saudi Arabia on May 15
The aircraft immediately returned to the Sultan Hasanuddin International Airport after ‘fire was observed in one of the engines’, an airline spokesperson said. No injuries were reported (pictured: the fire that broke out in the rear of the plane)
Bolts appear to be missing from the door plug that blew out of a Boeing 737 MAX during an Alaska Airlines flight on January 5
The door plug was recovered from the back yard of a home after it blew out on January 5
Garuda Indonesia president, Irfan Setiaputra, said in a statement about yesterday’s incident: ‘The captain discovered that one of the engines was on fire and immediately decided that further inspection was necessary to determine whether the engine was faulty.
‘The decision was made immediately after the aircraft took off.’
The airline said they provided accommodation for the affected passengers, while some were booked onto alternative flights to Saudi Arabia yesterday.
The plane has been kept grounded at the airport since the incident while safety inspections are carried out.
This recent failure comes after after Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 – a Boeing 737 Max 9 – lost a door plug at 16,000 feet on a flight from Portland, Oregon, to Ontario, California, on January 5.
That part is designed to replace an unneeded emergency exit door, and it blew out within just 20 minutes of takeoff.
An emergency landing was required and the plane landed safely, but a teddy bear, two mobile phones and 15-year-old passenger’s t-shirt were sucked out of the door mid-air.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) grounded 171 of the 737 Max 9 aircrafts in the aftermath and Alaska Airlines and United Airlines went on to find loose parts on their grounded jets’ door plugs.
An anonymous whistleblower broke rank to say that the door plug blowout ‘was Boeing’s fault’ on January 16, rather than its supplier Spirit AeroSystems.
On February 6, a National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) report said that the January 5 incident was down to four crucial bolds being missing from the panel which blew out.
In another incident, a United Airlines Boeing 737 Max 8 veered off the runway after landing in Houston due to some sort of gear collapse on March 3.
Shocking footage showed the plane lying flat on its wings on grass by the side of the runway, while passengers were hurried off from an emergency gate ladder.
Shocking footage showed the plane laying flat on its wings off the side off a runway, after suffering an apparent gear collapse
Passengers were seen being evacuated from the aircraft from an emergency gate ladder
Heart-stopping video has caught the moment a Boeing jet’s engines exploded and burst into flames in the skies above Texas forcing an emergency landing
The terrifying incident took place just minutes into a United Airlines flight bound for Fort Myers, Florida
Boeing whistleblower John Barnett was found dead in his truck outside a South Carolina hotel days after testifying against his former employer
The United Airlines flight 35 left San Francisco Airport on its way to Osaka in Japan and was barely off the runway with the Boeing 777-200’s wheel came off
A 256lb wheel has fallen from an airliner as it took off, crushing cars where it landed after plummeting to the ground
On March 4, an audit by the FAA of both Boeing and Spirit AeroSystems ‘found multiple instances where the companies allegedly failed to comply with manufacturing quality control requirements’.
Two days later, a 737’s engine caught fire in mid-air above Texas, causing an emergency landing minutes into its journey to Fort Myers, Florida.
A day after, on March 7, a wheel fell off a Boeing 777-200 shortly after takeoff from San Francisco, crushing cars below.
The plane with 235 passengers and 14 crew diverted to Los Angeles Airport after it was alerted to the landing gear failure and landed safely with no further incident and no injuries reported on the ground.
On March 9, Boeing whistleblower John Barnett, 62 – a former quality control manager and employee of 32 years – was found dead in his truck outside a South Carolina hotel days after testifying against the company in a lawsuit.
The coroner put it down to a ‘self-inflicted’ gunshot wound in the head, though the police confirmed that they would investigate further.
Barnett had made a string of complaints to his higher-ups in his time as a quality control manager before leaving the company on health grounds in 2017.
In January 2024, he appeared on TMZ to say that the 737 Max 9 aircraft were being launched back into the air too soon in the wake of the accident, suggesting corners had been cut.
On March 11, a Boeing 777 was was forced to land due to hydraulic fluid spewing from its landing gear area.
The forced landing happened as the San Francisco-bound 777-300 embarked from Sydney, with fluid filmed leaking from its undercarriage.
Another 737, this time from United Airlines, was grounded on March 15 after it was found to be missing a panel after it touched down successfully in Medford Airport, Oregon, despite the missing part.
A Boeing 737 900 bound for Atlanta was forced to turn back and make an emergency landing on March 20 after an engine blow out on take-off from Aruba.
Pictured: Boeing engineer Sam Salehpour testifies before the US Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on Investigations on April 17
Joshua Dean (pictured) died suddenly on April 30 aged 45 having raised the alarm about supposed defects in 737 Max jets
The Delta flight circled the Caribbean island four times before coming back into land following the ‘mechanical issue’.
In yet another incident, United Airlines flight 990 – a Boeing 777-200 – from San Francisco to Paris had to touch down early in Denver after engine problems on March 29.
On April 10, another whistleblower, Sam Salehpour, came forward to Boeing of taking shortcuts when building its 777 and 787 Dreamliner jets and added that the company had retaliated against him when he raised concerns.
He doubled down on the claims a week later, adding on NBC that 787s should be grounded fearing ‘fatal flaws’ which could case them to fall apart mid-air.
In a 1,500 word statement, Boeing said it was ‘fully confident’ in the 787 and called concerns about structural integrity ‘inaccurate.’
United Airlines indicated on April 16 it will reduce reliance on Boeing after announcing a $124m loss in the first quarter of 2024, which it blamed on the scandal-laden manufacturer.
On April 26, Delta flight 520 was forced to make an emergency landing at JFK Airport when an emergency slide fell off the Boeing 767 an hour into its journey to Los Angeles.
FAA records indicated that the plane was 33 years old.
A second whistleblower, Joshua Dean, died suddenly aged 45 having raised the alarm about supposed defects in 737 Max jets.
The former Spirit employee previously said he was fired from his quality auditing role for questioning standards at the supplier’s plant in Wichita, Kansas, in October 2022.
His family said on social media that Dean died in hospital after a sudden illness.
Earlier in 2024, Dean spoke with NPR about being fired. ‘I think they were sending out a message to anybody else. If you are too loud, we will silence you,’ he said.