英航赴芝加哥航班高空骤降近万米 氧气面罩弹出后盘旋四小时返航伦敦
一架飞往芝加哥的英国航空客机在跨大西洋途中上演惊魂一幕。当地时间10月5日，英航BA295航班自伦敦希思罗机场起飞后不久，在爱尔兰附近空域遭遇未明"技术故障"，飞机在数分钟内从约36000英尺高空骤降至约9000英尺，客舱氧气面罩自动弹出，机组随即宣布紧急状态。据航班追踪数据，这架波音777在威尔士沿岸上空盘旋约四小时消耗燃油，随后安全返回希思罗机场，乘客正常下机。英国航空在声明中表示，训练有素的飞行员在飞机出现技术问题后决定返航希思罗，飞机已安全着陆，公司团队正协助旅客尽快恢复后续行程。英航未进一步说明故障的具体性质。事件中暂无人员受伤报告。这起事件发生之际，跨大西洋航线的安全话题正受关注：不到一个月前，英国空中交通管制系统曾出现技术问题，导致数千架次航班取消。此次BA295的骤降幅度接近28000英尺，是近年来商业航班中较为罕见的紧急下降案例。对于芝加哥奥黑尔机场而言，这趟本应于当日抵达的航班最终未能成行，预订该航班的旅客被英航重新安排。资料来源：《纽约邮报》
British Airways Flight to Chicago Plunges Nearly 28,000 Feet, Circles for Hours Before Returning to London
A British Airways flight bound for Chicago O'Hare turned into a frightening ordeal on October 5. Flight BA295, a Boeing 777 that had departed London Heathrow, suffered an unspecified technical issue over Ireland and dropped from roughly 36,000 feet to about 9,000 feet within minutes, deploying passenger oxygen masks as the crew declared an emergency. The aircraft then circled off the Welsh coast for about four hours to burn fuel before landing safely back at Heathrow, where passengers disembarked normally. British Airways said its pilots returned to Heathrow following the technical issue, that the aircraft landed safely, and that its teams were working to restore customers' travel plans as quickly as possible. The airline did not specify the nature of the fault, and no injuries were reported. The incident came less than a month after technical problems with the United Kingdom's air traffic control system forced the cancellation of thousands of flights. Source: New York Post
图片来源：Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0, Beata May
