Ascend B738 at London on Apr 22nd 2025, incorrect takeoff performance

Last Update: July 9, 2026 / 10:48:34 GMT/Zulu time

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Incident Facts

Date of incident
Apr 22, 2025

Classification
Report

Airline
Ascend Airways

Flight number
W9-937

Departure
London Luton, United Kingdom

Destination
Athens, Greece

Aircraft Registration
G-CRUX

Aircraft Type
Boeing 737-800

ICAO Type Designator
B738

An Ascend Airways Boeing 737-800 on behalf of Wizz Air UK, registration G-CRUX performing flight W9-937 from London Luton,EN (UK) to Athens (Greece) with 162 passengers and 6 crew, had prepared for a balanced departure from Luton's runway 25 full length (2116 meters TORA), the thrust setting was computed at 82.1% N1. While taxiing out ATC cleared them for an intersection departure from taxiway A (TORA 1771 meters), which the crew accepted without recalculating their takeoff performance, the required takeoff thrust would have been 85.2% N1 however. The aircraft commenced takeoff, began to rotate 162 meters before the runway end and crossed the runway end at a height of 13 feet AGL. The aircraft continued to Athens for a safe landing.

The AAIB rated the occurrence a serious incident and released their final bulletin concluding the probable cause of the serious incident was:

The crew accepted a change to their planned departure point but did not verify that the takeoff performance was correctly entered in the FMC. This resulted in a lower power setting than required, and a long takeoff roll and slow climb out. If the aircraft had suffered a loss of thrust during takeoff, there was a potential that it would not have been able to stop on the remaining paved surface following a decision to reject the takeoff or, alternatively, achieve minimum height clearances during departure following a decision to continue the takeoff.
Incident Facts

Date of incident
Apr 22, 2025

Classification
Report

Airline
Ascend Airways

Flight number
W9-937

Departure
London Luton, United Kingdom

Destination
Athens, Greece

Aircraft Registration
G-CRUX

Aircraft Type
Boeing 737-800

ICAO Type Designator
B738

This article is published under license from Avherald.com. © of text by Avherald.com.
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