American Airlines flight’s ‘hard landing’ sends 6 to hospital

• Six people were taken to the hospital after an American Airlines flight landed in Maui.
• The FAA told Business Insider the plane experience a “hard landing.”
• The FAA said it is investigating the cause of the incident.

The FAA is investigating after six people were hospitalized following an incident on an American Airlines flight to Hawaii on Saturday.

The plane made a “hard landing” at Kahului Airport in Maui at 2 p.m. on Saturday after arriving from Los Angeles, the FAA told Business Insider in a statement. 

American Airlines meanwhile told BI the plane “experienced an issue” while landing but it taxied to the gate and everyone left the plane normally. The airline said one customer and five flight attendants were transported to the hospital following the flight. 

American took the plane out of service for inspection and maintenance following the incident, the company said. 

According to the Maui airport, the flight was scheduled to arrive at 12:47 p.m. but didn’t arrive until 2 p.m.,” NBC News reported. The plane taxied at Los Angeles International Airport for more than an hour before leaving the ground, according to flight data reviewed by NBC.

The Maui Police Department said police responded to the airport at about 2:21 p.m., according to Hawaii News Now.

There were 167 customers and seven crew members on the plane, American said.

The FAA told BI that it is investigating the cause of the incident.

The FAA also announced recently that it is halting production on Boeing Max planes after an Alaska Airlines flight lost a door thousands of feet in the air on January 5. The incident prompted the FAA to ground 171 Boeing Max 9 planes for inspection. 

“We will not agree to any request from Boeing for an expansion in production or approve additional production lines for the 737 MAX until we are satisfied that the quality control issues uncovered during this process are resolved,” FAA administrator Mike Whitaker said in a statement.

January has also been a rough month for American Airlines. The incident in Maui follows another on January 19 when an American Airlines flight slid off the runway in Rochester, New York during icy weather.