Salt Lake City, Utah – The pilots of a Delta Airlines flight from Salt Lake City to Washington, D.C. made an emergency landing in Denver after breaking the cockpit glass at an altitude of 30,000 feet.
Staff were repeatedly told to remain quiet until passengers landed.
“The glass on their speakerphone is broken and we will be back to Denver in 10 minutes,” Rachel Wright, one of the plane’s 198 passengers, told KUTV.
The photo of the mirror taken by a traveler shows the cracked glass that did not fall out of its frame. According to the station, the pilots of the passenger plane may be 2 inches, about 5 centimeters thick, with multi-layered glass panes.
Passengers said staff announced the diversion about 90 minutes after the plane reached an altitude of over 30,000 feet.
“Everyone kept telling me to be quiet, to be quiet. We were quiet, so they told us to be quiet when we were quiet, which made us a little panic,” Wright said.
Upon landing in Denver, passengers were able to see the broken glass.
Passengers on a flight from San Juan to Orlando experienced moments of panic as they were about to depart for Puerto Rico, the only testimony of a passenger on the Telemundo 31 news.
“I’m very good at playing, ‘What if?’ So what happened, my mind goes into a bad situation, I’m grateful, “Wright said. “It could have been so bad. It could have been so different.”
Another passenger, Kirk Nolden, took a photo and tweeted that staff had broken the glass spontaneously.
Delta spokesman Anthony Black confirmed Friday that there was a “windshield crack” but said the cause had not been determined.
“With great caution, the flight crew was diverted to Denver and the flight landed normally. Our team acted quickly to accommodate customers on a new flight, and we apologize for the delay and inconvenience in their travel plans,” the airline said in a statement.
Passengers boarded a new plane in Denver and headed for Washington. Wright praised Delta for landing the plane safely, saying the airline was very comfortable.
“I was never grateful to have spent an extra three hours at an airport,” Wright said.