One of the flights, American Airlines flight AA-95 from Madrid (Spain) to New York (USA) diverted to Lajes, in the Azores, due to engine problems, while the other, flight AA-739 from Lisbon to Philadelphia, was forced to return to Lisbon following a loss of water.
Both incidents happened last Saturday, 1 August, and, according to website Aviation Herald, within 20 minutes of each other.
Aviation Herald reported that the flight to New York was en-route to the USA and about 140 nautical miles northeast of Lajes “when the crew declared emergency and requested to divert to Lajes reporting a clogged engine fuel filter indication for the right hand engine.”
The aircraft landed safely some 20 minutes later.
Around the same time that that aircraft landed in Lajes, the second American Airlines plane, a Boeing 757-200, carrying 171 people from Lisbon to Philadelphia, said they too needed to divert to Lajes due to a loss of water.
However, according to Aviation Herald, “after receiving a message from their dispatch [it was] decided to cancel the emergency and return to Lisbon”, where the aircraft landed safely around four hours after departing from that same airport.
In related news, a day earlier, on Friday 31 July, a TAP flight from Lisbon to Luanda (Angola) was twice brought back to ground because of technical problems.
The aircraft, carrying 225 passengers, according to Aviation Herald, was first forced to return to Lisbon around 75 minutes after taking off due to an issue with a door sensor. Then, after departing again following three hours on the ground, the same flight had to divert to Seville, Spain, due to smoke in the cabin.
This was confirmed by a spokesperson for the national flag-carrier, who stressed “For TAP, the safety of its passengers, crew and their equipment comes in first place and is the first priority of all.”
The representative explained that “whenever any occurrence of a technical and/or operational nature manifests itself - before or during the flight – the most correct and appropriate decisions to the situation are always made, by the commander of the flight, in strict respect and compliance with the rules and procedures of current safety requirements.”
It was confirmed that the aircraft had had to return to Lisbon a short while after takeoff due to a visual warning regarding an electronic sensor on one of the plane’s doors.
Passengers were reportedly given a meal while the aircraft was serviced by TAP’s maintenance and engineering team, and recommenced the journey after a delay of “around three hours.”
“After some time flying, and in the vicinity of Seville, it was decided to divert the flight to Seville for technical reasons: the presence of smoke in the cabin.”
Passengers were put up in hotels in Seville overnight and continued their journey to Luanda on a replacement aircraft flown in the following morning, Saturday 1 August.
The incident aircraft was flown back to Lisbon that same Friday where it was again inspected by the airline’s maintenance and engineering team before resuming service.
“Given the occurrences, TAP very much regrets the inconvenience caused”, TAP said.