Southwest flight to Vegas returns to Oakland airport after door-seal air leak discovered
FILE - A Southwest Airlines plane approaches the runway. (DANIEL SLIM/AFP via Getty Images)
OAKLAND, Calif. - A Las Vegas-bound Southwest flight had to return to Oakland's airport shortly after takeoff on Monday when an air leak around a door seal developed, an airline spokesperson confirms.
Flight returns to Oakland
What we know:
Southwest Flight 3295, scheduled to depart from Oakland at 7:55 p.m., had to return to the Bay Area and the flight was rescheduled to depart some two and a half hours late, a flight tracker website shows.
"The Pilots followed procedure and returned to the airport, where the flight landed uneventfully," Southwest spokesperson Lynn Lunsford said.
The Boeing 737's door is designed so that it cannot open when the cabin is pressurized, Lunsford added.
Apparently, passengers on the delayed flight heard a sound.
"The sound the Passengers heard came from pressurized air seeping past the door seal," Lunsford said. Despite the noise, the incident was not a safety issue, the Southwest spokesperson claimed.
Southwest said they are working to accommodate customers. They said the safety of their employees and customers is their priority.
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