AA MD-80 Loses Engine on Takeoff From LGA

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Plane makes emergency landing after LaGuardia take-off
LaGuardia flight lands after engine failure

BY BILL MASON | [email protected]
11:00 PM EDT, August 4, 2008

An American Airlines MD-80 bound for Atlanta was forced to make an emergency landing Monday afternoon after one of its two rear-mounted engines failed shortly after takeoff off from LaGuardia Airport, officials said. No one was injured and the cause of the engine failure was not known late Monday night, said Tim Wagner, an American Airlines spokesman. Passengers were reassigned to other flights, including aboard other airlines, to be transported to Atlanta, he said.
American Airlines flight 2393 took off from runway 4 at 4:39 p.m., and immediately, airport personnel knew there was a problem, officials said.

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Full Story Here

Sounds pretty scary. Yes, I know the eyewitnesses in the article probably don't know what they're talking about, and leveling out to 600ft in that situation is probably SOP, but having seen many a Mad Dog use up 6500 of those 7000 feet with TWO engines makes me think it could have been awfully close to a disaster.

I happened to see this aircraft turning final while heading home from spotting. Didn't really think much of it except for the unusual approach. Thought it was a go around or something.

According to the article in Newsday even the controllers at LGA were worried including NATC Pres Bill McLoughlin who was
working in the Tower at the time.

I heard there was junk all over 4.

I heard this on the scanner as I was at JFK. They stopped all JFK traffic.
Senga

I picked it up on ACARSD
ACARS mode: 2 Aircraft reg: .N592AA
Message label: _ Block id: 5 Msg. no: 4506
Flight id: AA2393
-----------------------------------------------------------[04/08/2008 16:45]

I saw it fly over me while I was waiting for the Kuwaiti 744.
http://www.nycaviation.com/hosting/aalll.gif

Senga