klm 661 ams to iah

if i look at todays tracking, it says it was deverted… but looking at the airport code, it doesnt show anything…
Date Type Origin Destination Departure Arrival Duration
08-Jun-2007 B744/W Schiphol (EHAM) (KJAH) 02:35PM GMT Diverted
08-Jun-2007 B744/W Schiphol (EHAM) George Bush Intctl Houston (KIAH) 02:23PM GMT 01:28PM CDT En Route

can anyone tell me why and if it has been deverted how come?

thank you
texas :slight_smile:

This has to do with a typographical error somewhere in the flight plan. Somebody put JAH where they should’ve put IAH for the destination. As a result, it is showing up as a diversion from the intended destination.

Can’t tell for sure, but there is a line of strong Tunderstorms from Cincinnati down almost to the Texas boader. I would suspect that winds are stronger than they planned for when in Schiphol and may not have fuel w/ reserves to make it to Houston.

Welcome to FlightAware.

Note: Anybody know what airport JAH is? KJAH is apparently a popular reggie radio station (at least google reports). Perhaps it is a keying error.

Edit to add that I don’t know if Needle is selling, but I’ll buy his answer.

thanks for the replies mates… :stuck_out_tongue:

How is this typo possible? Better yet, how do you know this?

Invalid codes would have been rejected by the computer outright and there is no chance of a typo in a flight plan.

BTW, looked up JAH and it’s not a fix, or an airport.

Allen

Couple of possibilites;
Is this the day the ATC computers went down on the east coast? The flight could have already been enroute when that happened, the controller that put the flight plan back in may have entered IAH wrong.
Its not common, but not unheard of, for overseas ATC computers to not talk to each other forcing a manual input of the flight plan. We get asked for routing information about 10% of the time by Athens ATC after leaving Cairo’s airspace. It’s like the flight plan never made it, but the ATC co-ordination took place.

[quote=“lieberma”]

I don’t know enough about the system to know how or why it’s possible, but it makes absolute logical sense. There is no “JAH” in the system and, when the message was posted, the plane was indeed flying toward IAH. A “J” can look like an “I” when written on paper if somebody is sloppy enough in writing. I’ve never seen a controller’s alpha-numeric input device, but on a standard “qwerty” keyboard the “I” is just above and to the right of the “J” - an easy mistake. Yes, the OP’s question was posted during the ATC computer downtime. There simply is no other explanation other than a typo or someone misreading something somewhere.

Still doesn’t make any sense whatsover. Please re-read my second paragraph.

IF and a big IF a person put in an incorrect identifier (typo) in the computer, then the computer should have rejected it. No matter how sloppy one’s handwriting would be, transferring that data into the computer wouldn’t have gone through, simple as that.

I just logged on DUATS (FAA systems as it gets) and tried inputting a flight plan from MBO to JAH and it rejected it right away.

Something abnormal happened obviously, but it wasn’t because of something that was input into any computer that validates airports and fixes.

Maybe an ATC person can chime in here.

Allen

There’s a manual override for every automated system. Just because you don’t know about it, or don’t know how to implement it, doesn’t mean the mistake is not possible.

It’d be nice to know exactly what happened and how, but I’m not gonna lose any sleep over it.

Houston-bound plane loses power to engine

08:44 PM CDT on Saturday, June 9, 2007

11 News staff report

A passenger plane with 287 people onboard that had reported having lost power landed safely at Bush Intercontinental Airport Saturday afternoon. Emergency crews were on alert for the KLM flight 662 was enroute to Houston from Amsterdam.

11 News

KLM flight 662 with 287 passengers aboard landed safely at Bush IAH after reporting losing power to one of its engines Saturday.
The captain reported losing power to the planes No. 4 engine. There were no reports of injuries, fires or other serious incidents with the plane.

All of the passengers reportedly got off the plane without further delay.