Engine fire delays takeoff of Boeing 737 from Lubbock, Texas airport; no injuries reported

All passengers on a Boeing 737 are safe after the plane's takeoff was delayed at the Lubbock Preston Smith Airport in Texas on Thursday evening due to a reported engine fire, the latest incident to occur on a Boeing 737 aircraft.

Southwest Airlines flight 1928 was preparing to depart to Las Vegas but returned to the gate before takeoff for a reported engine fire, according to a city of Lubbock news release. The flight crew reported a possible engine fire shortly after the plane taxied from the gate. Lubbock Fire Rescue responded and was on standby as the plane returned to the gate on its own power.

Lubbock is located in the northwest part of the state, about 124 miles south of Amarillo and 345 miles west of Dallas.

In a social media post, the fire department said Aircraft Rescue Firefighting units were on the scene and confirmed the fire was contained to a single engine, with operations underway around 6:30 p.m. to extinguish it.

After the fire Thursday, the city said runway 17R was closed for cleaning and inspection. The airport urged travelers to check with their airline for up-to-date flight status information.

In a statement to the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, part of the USA TODAY Network, Southwest estimated that the travelers, who were put on another plane, would arrive in Las Vegas about three hours behind schedule.

Other issues found recently on Boeing 737 planes

The engine fire at the Lubbock, Texas airport is the latest issue to be found recently in a Boeing 737 aircraft.

• In January, a left door plug flew out of an Alaska Airlines 737 flight. The flight was headed to Ontario, California, from Portland when the incident occurred. The plane returned to Portland with all passengers and six crew members, who deplaned safely. The incident caused the Federal Aviation Administration to ground approximately 171 Boeing 737 Max 9 jets.
• In February, a United Airlines Boeing 737 aircraft from Nassau, Bahamas to Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey experienced "stuck" rudder pedals on its landing roll, according to a preliminary report from the National Transportation Safety Board released in March.
• The same month, Ed Clark, the head of Boeing's 737 Max program, exited the company immediately, Boeing's CEO said in a memo to employees.
• On March 8, passengers that had landed at George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston, Texas had to evacuate after the United Airlines Boeing 737 Max 8 plane tilted and rolled onto the grass from the taxiway. No one was injured, but passengers had to use emergency stairs and were bussed to terminals.
• On March 15, a panel was found to be missing on the underside of a United Airlines Boeing 737-800 plane after it had landed in Medford, Oregon, the Associated Press reported. No injuries were reported on the flight, and the plane had already arrived at its destination in San Francisco, when a post-flight inspection found the missing panel.

Still, experts insist it's safe to fly, despite the months of heightened tension around air travel.

“We don’t have to worry that there’s something systemically wrong with aviation,” Clint Balog, an associate professor at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, previously told USA TODAY.

After the blowout of the Alaska Air plane in January, people have become more aware of aviation incidents than they were in the past, said Laura Einsetler, a captain at a major U.S. airline and author of the Captain Laura blog.

“One aspect is that now with social media and the internet, we’re seeing every single thing that we can possibly see that’s happening around the world," she told USA TODAY last month. "The perception is that more things are happening when at the same time, 2023 was actually the safest year in our industry of all time.”

Contributing: Zach Wichter, Krystal Nurse and Thao Nguyen, USA TODAY.