Passenger captures terrifying moment wing ‘comes apart’ forcing flight to make emergency landing

United Airlines passengers are taking to social media in horror after one of their plane's wings ended up 'coming apart' mid-air.

On Monday (20 February), an United Airlines flight from San Francisco to Boston had to make an emergency landing in Denver.

Passengers have since spoken out about the incident and shared photographs online, images showing one of the plane's wings appearing to shred.

Catch the terrifying moment here:

Kimberly Clarke took to Facebook to share a clip recorded by her husband - one of the 165 passengers onboard the Boeing 757-200 flight.

In the video, Kevin Clarke can be heard saying: "Just about to land in Denver with the wing coming apart on the plane. It came apart when we took off in San Francisco, and we’re just about on the ground. Can’t wait for this flight to be over.

"They’ve got another plane waiting for us. Touchdown any second, and the nightmare will be over."

Kevin recorded the moment landed, the caption of his wife's post reading: "The wing was coming apart in the air! Everyone is safe thank God."

Getty Images/ Tayfun Coskun/ Anadolu

Another passenger, Kevin Clarke, told NBC Boston he knew something was wrong when he began to hear an 'incredibly loud vibration' during takeoff.

He then turned to look out of his window to find one of the plane's wings did 'not' look 'normal at all', and says around an hour later the pilot announced on the PA the airline had 'discovered [...] some damage on one of the front flaps' and would be diverting.

And a fellow passenger took to Reddit during the flight to share their concern.

u/Octopus_hug posted to r/unitedairlines with a picture of the damaged wing, stating: "Sitting right on the wing and the noise after reaching altitude was much louder than normal. I opened the window to see the wing looking like this. How panicked should I be? Do I need to tell a flight crew member?"

Thankfully, all 165 passengers were safely diverted to Denver, the plane reported as landing at around 5:15pm.

An United Airlines spokesperson told UNILAD: "United flight 354 diverted to Denver Monday afternoonto address an issue with the slat on the wing of the aircraft.

"The flight landed safely and we arranged for a different aircraft to take customers to their destination, which arrived in Boston later that evening."

An investigation into the incident is being conducted by the Federal Aviation Administration. It's not yet been publicly confirmed how the damage to the wing occurred.

Topics: Travel, Reddit, Facebook, Social Media, US News

Poppy Bilderbeck

Poppy Bilderbeck is a Senior Journalist at LADbible Group. She graduated from The University of Manchester in 2021 with a First in English Literature and Drama, where alongside her studies she was Editor-in-Chief of The Tab Manchester. Poppy is most comfortable when chatting about all things mental health, is proving a drama degree is far from useless by watching and reviewing as many TV shows and films as possible and is such a crisp fanatic the office has been forced to release them in batches.