Passengers onboard a Frontier Airlines flight from Atlanta to San Juan found themselves in Miami after the aircraft needed to divert under precaution to Miami after identifying a potential fuel leak. The captain made an emergency landing at one of Florida’s busiest airports, met at the gate by several fire trucks operated by the airport’s Miami-Dade Airport Fire Rescue (MDFR) team.

The flight, operated by one of the Denver ultra-low-cost-carriers Airbus A320neo, was flying across the Atlantic Ocean and had just passed over the Bahamas when the potential fuel leak was identified. Out of an abundance of caution, the captain made the call to return to the closest potential diversion airport in the United States, Miami. It is worth noting that neither the airline nor other media outlets have yet to confirm the cause of the emergency landing, and it is only alleged to have been caused by a potential fuel leak.

U-Turn Over The Atlantic

Credit: GCMap

According to Flightradar24, flight 2082, operated by N301FR, had departed from Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL) on Christmas Day, pushing back from the Georgian airport at 11:01 am, some 41 minutes behind its scheduled departure time of 10:20 am. It had an expected arrival time into Luis Munoz Marin International Airport (SJU), San Juan, Puerto Rico, of 3:01 pm local time.

Setting its sights on Puerto Rico, the Airbus A320neo reached its cruising altitude relatively quickly and was at 34,000 feet by the time it passed over Jacksonville, Florida. Heading out over the Atlantic Ocean, the aircraft had just passed over the Bahamian island of Grand Abaco, approximately one hour and 20 minutes into the nearly three-hour scheduled flight, when the potential fuel leak was identified, with the captain making the swift decision to turn back to the United States.

Simple Flying reached out to the team at Frontier Airlines for a statement on the flight; their spokesperson did not immediately respond.

Landing Safely In Miami

Credit: Flickr

Approximately 43 minutes after the decision to head for Miami, the aircraft arrived under emergency landing conditions at Miami International Airport (MIA) and taxiied to Gate F18, where the plane was met by the airport fire rescue team. Crew were on hand to inspect the aircraft thoroughly to ascertain the leak, and the passengers onboard were then permitted to disembark the A320neo after 6:00 pm local time.

Passengers were re-accommodated onto a replacement flight, operated by another Frontier Airbus A320neo (registration N328FR). This service departed from MIA at 8:23 pm, and arrived in San Juan two hours and one minute later, touching down at 11:24 local time. Some six hours after their expected arrival time from Atlanta.

According to WSVN, the emergency landing did not cause any major disruption to the airport, and other flights were able to arrive and depart without any delays.

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Nine-Year-Old N301FR

Credit: Flickr

The aircraft at the centre of the diversion (pictured) is a nine-and-a-half-year Airbus A320neo, which, according to ch-aviation, took its first test flight under French Airbus registration F-WWDA on July 7, 2016. The aircraft has been painted in the airline’s unique livery, which commonly features wild or endangered species.

This aircraft has been painted with a Whitetail deer named ‘Wilbur’, which is spotted across North, Central, and South America. Having been delivered to Frontier Airlines on October 20, 2016, the aircraft was the first Airbus A320neo. Frontier now operates 84 of the aircraft type, and these are powered by CFMI LEAP-1A26 engines.

The aircraft remains on the apron at MIA at the time of writing. Data from Flightradar24 indicates the plane is set to operate flight 3379 from Miami to San Juanon Friday, December 26, at 05:05 am, with an expected arrival time of 08:39 am.