HOUSTON — A plane that left Knoxville was diverted to Dallas after a mechanical issue while en route to Houston, a United Airlines spokesperson confirms.
Flight 4390 landed safely in Dallas late Thursday after departing Knoxville at 6:40 p.m.
Houston resident Rodney D. Giles, whose parents were on the plane, tweeted a video of a crew member explaining the situation to passengers after landing.
In the video, a pilot came over the cabin loudspeaker and said they lost two cockpit screens while in flight.
“So you may be able to see, we lost two of our screens,” the pilot said. “Now if we kept flying, we’d lose them all – eventually – because there’s not enough cooling. There’s tremendous heat behind those screens.”
The crew then said that they had to land as soon as possible because if they continued "eventually we'd be flying blind."
They also said it was unlikely the aircraft was going anywhere that night.
United released the following statement about the incident on Friday morning:
ExpressJet Airlines flight 4390, operating as United Express from Knoxville to Houston, diverted to Dallas and landed safely following a mechanical issue. Customers deplaned normally and we are working to get our customers on their way to their destination as soon as possible.
United also said the aircraft was being inspected by its maintenance team.
"It shouldn’t impact other flights, but we always encourage our customers to check the status of their flight on united.com or the app for the latest updates," a spokesperson told WBIR-TV.
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