BA flight forced to make emergency landing due to 'burning smell'

A British Airways flight from the UK to the US was forced to make an emergency landing after staff detected a burning smell.

The BA flight was diverted to Houston after a crew member detected a "burning smell" on board the plane, Flight BA195 from London's Heathrow to Houston diverted to Chicago's O'Hare International Airport.

A spokeswoman for British Airways said the flight was diverted as a precaution after "what was thought to be a burning smell" was detected on board.

She said the smell was due to a fault with one of the television screens used for in-flight entertainment which had since been repaired.

BA said that none of the nearly 90 passengers and 15 crew members was in danger and that passengers were taken into the terminal building at Chicago and transferred on to domestic flights to enable them to continue their journey to Houston.

The spokeswoman said: "We apologise for the inconvenience to passengers but the crew did exactly the right thing in diverting as a precaution."

The plane landed at 1.20pm local time on Sunday (7.20pm BST).

Chicago Aviation Department spokesman Gregg Cunningham said that nobody was injured.

Chicago Fire Department spokesman Will Knight said the plane was secured without incident around an hour after it landed.

Only last month it was reported that a British Airways pilot had made an emergency landing at Heathrow after the crew smelled smoke in the cockpit.

The Airbus A319, carrying 121 passengers, was only 10 minutes into its flight to Zurich when the pilot announced that fumes had been detected coming from an air conditioning unit.

The captain of the flight decided to return to Heathrow as a precautionary measure.

Passengers were transferred to a replacement flight for their journey, and engineers were brought in to examine the plane.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travelnews/3143483/BA-flight-forced-to-make-emergency-landing-due-to-burning-smell.html

Fonte: Flight Safety Information 07/10/2008.