The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has opened an investigation after an emergency evacuation slide fell from a Delta Air Lines aircraft and landed in the back garden of a house in the Massachusetts town of Milton. Thankfully, no one was injured in the Sunday morning incident.
According to the Boston Globe, the captain of Delta flight DL405 reported a loud noise as the aircraft was on approach to Boston Logan international airport. The Milton Police Department later alerted aviation authorities that an emergency slide had been discovered in a local back garden of a private residence.
The near 20-year old Boeing 767 was coming to the end of a seven hour flight from Paris, France when the incident occured. While most emergency slides are actually stored within the cabin, this slide was from the overwing exit which is hidden within the wing.
It’s still not clear how the slide came to deploy in flight, however, overwing emergency exits are permanently ‘armed’ and ready to inflate at a moments notice.
“Delta is investigating an inflatable over-wing slide that was retrieved following an aircraft’s landing into Boston’s Logan Airport,” the airline said in a statement.
“The flight landed without incident and taxied to the gate under its own power,” the spokesperson continued.
Only once the plane was safely on the ground did maintenance workers discover the right hand side overwing slide was missing.
The spokesperson did not speculate on the cause of the accident.
