Southwest Plane Lands at Wrong Airport, Narrowly Avoids Precipice

And with the runway being too short for a Boeing 737, it couldn't take off again

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Correction appended, Jan. 13 2014

A Southwest Airlines Boeing 737 landed at the wrong airport on Sunday, stranding its passengers in Hollister, Mo.

It is unclear why the airplane, which was headed for nearby Branson, Mo., touched down at an airport 9 miles (14 km) away from its intended destination, but it appears it will stay there for a while, since the 3,700-ft. (1,130 m) runway is not sufficiently long for the Boeing jet to take off.

None of the passengers were injured, but one of them, Scott Schieffer, tweeted about heavy braking when the plane landed. As he disembarked he tweeted that “the mood is somber now that we realized we were 40 ft. [12 m] from the edge of a cliff.”

Southwest provided an airplane to lift the passengers out four hours after the erroneous landing.

Correction: The original version of this story misstated the city where the Southwest flight was flying to when it mistakenly landed at the wrong airport.

[Forbes]