An easyJet plane leaving Porto for Basel declared an emergency and diverted to Nantes, France, this Friday morning. It has since continued its journey and landed at its original destination.
An easyJet plane leaving Porto this Friday morning declared an emergency and diverted to Nantes, France, to provide assistance to a passenger “who felt unwell”, easyJet said. The aircraft resumed its journey in the meantime and arrived safely at its original destination, EuroAirport, which serves Mulhouse (France), Basel (Switzerland) and Freiburg (Germany).
“Nantes airport was the closest and was part of the route,” said the airline, explaining the decision to divert to the French airport when one of the passengers on board felt ill on Friday morning.
Flight EJU7731 departed from Sá Carneiro airport in Porto at 7.11 am. The Airbus A320-200, with capacity for 168 people, was due to land in Basel at 10.25 a.m. (9.25 a.m. mainland Portugal time), but declared an emergency and diverted to Nantes airport in France.
According to aviation websites, the plane issued a generic emergency warning, code 7700, calling for an immediate landing and a clear runway.
According to the Aviation Source website, the plane declared an emergency at 7.58 a.m., mainland Portugal time, as it approached the southwest coast of France. It landed in Nantes 22 minutes later, at 8.20am, without any problems.
About an hour later, it took off from Nantes for its original destination, where it landed at 11.22 am local time (10.22 am in mainland Portugal).
The same plane has already resumed operations and is operating the Basel-Porto flight, about an hour behind schedule. It should land at Invicta at 13.31 hours, according to the easyJet website.