If you’re a frequent flyer, there really can’t be anything more terrifying than the phrase “low on fuel.” And that’s what passengers on a United Airlines flight from Hawaii to California heard recently.
About two hours into the flight, the pilots realized that, due to a condition known as “overburn,” they would not have enough fuel to make it to San Francisco. The overburn was caused by the wind directing being the opposite of what they were expecting. So the pilots made the decision to turn the plane around and head back to Hawaii.
While this was probably super scary and kind of inconvenient for most on the flight, we can think of about a million places that would be far worse to be stranded for an extra night.
