A flight from Malaysia which was about to land on the runway of Da Nang International Airport in the namesake Vietnamese city suddenly took off again, causing panic among the passengers on Friday afternoon.

Flight AK648 departed from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia at 10:30 am and arrived at Da Nang City at 12:15 pm on the day, according to its passengers' accounts.

While reaching the runway, the plane floated a little, but did not touch down.

Instead, it spooled up to takeoff thrust and quickly climbed away from the runway.

The aircraft was back into the air and fly around for more than 15 minutes before the captain conducted another approach and successfully landed it.

“When the plane was only about five to ten metes above the ground, it suddenly roared and rocketed into the air again for an unknown reason,” said passenger N.M.V. 

“The passengers were all shocked because almost no one had experienced such circumstance before.”

The plane landed at the beginning of the runway on the second approach, according to V.

The crew apologized to the passengers and explained later that the runway was unsafe for landing on the first approach, so the captain decided to head back into the air, V. added.

The operation center of Da Nang International Airport declined to provide more information about the case, regarding a request by Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper.

A leader of the Middle Airports and Airfields Authority explained that cases where a plane picks up altitude when it is about to touch down and turns back to fly another approach to the runway are not rare.

The procedure is called a balked landing.

“In many unfavorable cases, such as detecting animals or birds on the runway, the pilot has to perform a balked landing,” the leader said.

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