Passengers evacuate plane on slides after Delta flight aborts takeoff
Elijah Nouvelage/Bloomberg via Getty Images
(ATLANTA) — Hundreds of passengers were forced to evacuate on slides during a snowstorm after their Delta flight aborted takeoff from Atlanta due to an engine issue Friday morning, the airline said.
Delta Flight 2668 was traveling from Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport to Minneapolis-St. Paul when it suspended takeoff shortly after 9 a.m. due to “an indication of an engine issue,” the airline said.
Passengers exited the Boeing 757-300 aircraft through emergency slides and ground transportation was used to take them back to the terminal.
Four passengers reported minor injuries in the incident, with one transported to an area hospital, the airport said. The other three were treated at the scene, the airport said. The nature of their injuries was not immediately clear.
The plane was carrying 201 passengers and seven crew members.
“Nothing is more important than the safety of our people and customers, and we apologize to our customers for their experience,” Delta said in a statement. “We are working to support our customers and get them to their destinations as safely and quickly as possible.”
The Federal Aviation Administration said it will investigate.
Operations at the Atlanta airport were delayed due to the incident and the “ongoing severe weather,” the airport said in a statement.
Approximately 2 inches of snow had fallen by noon in Atlanta, the most in seven years, as a massive winter storm impacts the South.
More than 2,600 flights across the country have been canceled as of midday Friday due to the storm, with Atlanta, Charlotte, Dallas and Nashville seeing the biggest impacts.
(NEW YORK) — Texas has the potential to become a major producer of green hydrogen due to its existing energy infrastructure, according to researchers.
That infrastructure is making Texas a “valuable case study” in decarbonizing states that currently produce a high volume of fossil fuels, a study published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found.
The Lone Star State already has an operational infrastructure for green hydrogen – a clean energy source made through electrolysis, a process that involves splitting water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen without producing harmful carbon emissions – according to Michael McElroy, a professor of environmental studies at Harvard University and author of the study. Green hydrogen has the potential to decarbonize up to 25% of global energy-related carbon dioxide emissions, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.
“Hydrogen itself could be a really important component to a green transition,” Jessika Trancik, a professor of energy systems for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who was not involved with the study, told ABC News.
In addition, Texas has an established demand for hydrogen and already has ample renewable electricity resources, the PNAS study found. For example, Texas is the highest producer of wind power in the U.S., generating 26% of the country’s wind-sourced energy, according to state officials. It also has ample solar resources, according to Trancik.
“Texas is very well situated in terms of its renewable resources,” Trancik said, adding that they’re “very extensive and high quality” and include an existing infrastructure that could easily also incorporate green hydrogen production.
Upon winning the 2020 presidential election, President Joe Biden vowed to make green hydrogen more accessible as part of his clean energy plan, promising that the U.S. would be able to access green hydrogen at the same cost as conventional hydrogen within a decade.
By 2030, Texas could produce more than 50 million tons of green hydrogen at a cost at about $1.50 per kilogram, the PNAS study found. That low production cost will result from integrating the water electrolysis process with the existing renewable electricity grid, according to the study, and will also enhance grid reliability and “significantly” influence decarbonization in the state.
It would also position Texas to become a major supplier of green hydrogen for both domestic and international needs, the PNAS study found. Hydrogen demand is expected to “grow at a moderate, steady pace” over the next six years and then accelerate significantly, according to PricewaterhouseCoopers.
Additionally, the cost of producing hydrogen from renewable electricity could fall 30% by 2030 due to the declining costs of renewables and the upscaling of hydrogen production, according to the International Energy Agency.
Green hydrogen is forecast to meet global energy needs that will not be easily satisfied by battery, wind or solar power, Gregory Nemet, professor of public affairs at the University of Wisconsin’s Energy Institute, told ABC News in 2021. Batteries, for example, currently can take up a lot of space and also weigh a lot, making their use an issue for air travel and long-haul trucking. Hydrogen, by contrast, doesn’t include those challenges and also stores better long-term.
In addition, the infrastructure to transport green hydrogen – which needs to pressurized – is already in place, whether it be through pipelines, shipping or trucking, Nemet said. In Texas, a lot of the required infrastructure that will next be built will be for storage, Trancik said.
Hydrogen City, an integrated green hydrogen production hub located in southern Texas near the Port of Corpus Christi, is already producing about 280,000 metric tons of green hydrogen per year. But green hydrogen alone won’t be enough to meet anticipated future green energy demands, according to Trancik.
It will take “different clusters or combinations of technologies” to combat climate change on all fronts, which is where energies like green hydrogen and nuclear come in, Trancik said. “There’s a lot of efforts to try to grow that industry and take it in new, innovative directions.”
(NEW ORLEANS) — President Joe Biden and first lady Jill Biden are scheduled to travel on Monday to New Orleans, where they’ll attend a prayer service for families of victims and impacted community members following the New Year’s Day attack in the city.
The Biden are expected to arrive in New Orleans in the afternoon, touching down a few hours before the prayer service, which is to be hosted by the Archdiocese of New Orleans, according to the White House.
The visit comes days after a suspect, Shamsud-Din Jabbar, 42, an Army veteran and Houston realtor, allegedly drove a rented truck into Bourbon Street in the early hours of New Year’s Day. At least 14 people were killed and dozens were injured in the attack, which occurred over a three-block stretch of of the tourist destination in New Orleans’ bustling French Quarter.
Jabbar, a Texas resident who FBI officials said proclaimed his support for the terror group ISIS in social media posts ahead of the attack, was killed in gunfire exchanged with New Orleans police.
The 14 victims who died included a young mother teaching her son to read, a former college football player “on top of the world” living in New York City and an 18-year-old aspiring nurse.
The prayer service the Bidens are set to attend on Monday is scheduled to begin at about 6 p.m. at the Cathedral-Basilica of Saint Louis, King of France, according to the White House and the Archdiocese.
“Archbishop [Gregory Michael] Aymond continues to offer his prayers and condolences to those affected by this tragedy,” the Archdiocese said in its announcement. “He asks that all join in prayer for our community today and every day as we work to build a culture that respects the life and dignity of all people.”
Map of the area around Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport and the layout of Runway 33, which the regional American Airlines jet was approaching at the time of the collision with the Army Black Hawk helicopter, according to officials. Via ABC News
(WASHINGTON) — The crash involving a regional aircraft and a Black Hawk helicopter near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport on Wednesday marks the first major commercial crash in the United States since 2009.
The last crash took place on Feb. 12, 2009, when Colgan Air Flight 3407 crashed during landing near Buffalo Niagara International Airport, killing all 49 people onboard.
There have been other deadly incidents in the U.S., such as the Asiana runway crash at San Francisco International Airport in 2013. Three people died when Flight 214 came in to the airport too low and too slow, hit a seawall and sheared the tail section and left engine off the plane as it spun down the runway.
One of the three who was killed was run over by an emergency vehicle responding to the crash.
Nearly 200 people were also injured in that crash, which was blamed on the Asiana Airlines pilots mismanaging the autopilot system, according to the National Transportation Safety Board.
The last fatality on a plane in the U.S. came in 2018 when a woman was partially sucked out of a Southwest Airlines window.
Passenger Jennifer Riordan died in that incident, when Flight 1380 suffered engine failure and had to make an emergency landing in Philadelphia.
