US-bound flight takes off with two missing windows, reaches 15,000 feet before crew notices
A plane previously used by Britain’s King Charles and Prime Minister Rishi Sunak was forced to turn around after reaching an altitude of 14,500 feet when crew members realized two of its windows were missing.
The Airbus A321 took off from London Stansted Airport for Orlando on Oct. 4 with windows that were damaged by high-powered lights used during a film shoot the day before, the Independent reported.
The Titan Airways aircraft was carrying 11 crew members and nine passengers who were employees of the airline and the US-based luxury tour company TCS World Travel, according to an incident report by the Air Accidents Investigations Branch.
A crew member noticed after takeoff that the seal around one of the windows was “flapping” and that the noise in the cabin was “loud enough to damage your hearing,” according to the agency.
The crew reportedly discovered that two window assemblies — the inner and outer panes and rubber seals — were missing, and that only the plastic scratch panes remained in place.
The pilots stopped the climb and reduced the airspeed as the plane halted its transcontinental journey and headed back to London. There were no “abnormal indications” in the cockpit and the cabin remained pressurized “normally,” the AAIB said.
The frightening incident happened a day after the plane was used for filming and powerful lights were set up nearby to “give the illusion of a sunrise,” according to investigators.
The lights were shone on the right side of the jet for over five hours and on the left for four hours, the AAIB said, adding that they were designed to be used no closer than 32 feet from an object, but were between 20 and 30 feet from the windows.
A close examination revealed that foam used to hold the components in place had either melted from high temperatures or was completely missing.
The damaged panes were “deformed and shrunk[en],” according to the AAIB.
“Whereas in this case the damage became apparent at around FL100 (10,000 feet) and the flight was concluded uneventfully, a different level of damage by the same means might have resulted in more serious consequences, especially if window integrity was lost at higher differential pressure,” the AAIB said.
The same plane had been used by King Charles and Queen Camilla for their recent state visit to France, the Sun reported.
It also had reportedly been used by Sunak and UK Foreign Secretary James Cleverly before being made available for private service, according to the outlet.
