Passenger Jet Carrying 165 People Aborts Takeoff at 123mph After Pilot Mixes Up Taxiway with Runway
The incident reportedly happened at Brussels Airport in Belgium on Thursday, Feb. 5
Kimberlee Speakman
Fri, February 6, 2026 at 5:16 PM UTC
3 min read
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NEED TO KNOW
A Scandinavian Airlines flight at Brussels Airport was canceled on the evening of Thursday, Feb. 5
This happened after the pilot reportedly aborted takeoff after beginning procedures on a taxiway instead of one of airport's runways
Scandinavian Airlines said it is "conducting a thorough internal investigation alongside local authorities to understand the sequence of events," per Air Live
A Scandinavian Airlines flight was canceled after the plane’s pilot reportedly began its takeoff on a taxiway instead of the runway.
The incident happened at Brussels Airport on the evening of Thursday, Feb. 5, and affected SAS flight SK2590, which was headed to Copenhagen, according to Aerospace Global News, Air Live and The Aviation Herald.
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The plane, an Airbus A320neo with 165 people on board, had been cleared for takeoff on Runway 07L— one of the primary runways at the airport — but ended up on a parallel taxiway, according to the outlets.
While on the parallel taxiway, the plane began its takeoff procedures, but then aborted takeoff just as the plane reached a speed of about 123 mph (107 knots over ground), Air Live and the Herald reported, citing data from Flightradar24. An image of the flight's path shared by Flightradar24 appears to show that the aircraft came to a stop near the runway before returning to its original depature location at the airport.
The Herald reported that the pilot realized the error at the point where the taxiway lane got narrower and the pilot managed to stop the plane before a taxiway intersection and just short of the airport's fuel tanks.
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Emergency services responded to the scene and the passengers on the plane disembarked onto the taxiway as maintenance personnel inspected the plane’s braking system, which would have undergone extreme heat during the sudden stop, per Air Live.
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The passengers were transported back to the terminal. No injuries were reported, according to the outlets. The flight was eventually canceled following the incident.
PEOPLE has reached out to Scandinavian Airlines for comment on the incident.
Simon Berneblad Mandegård, a passenger on board the flight, described the incident as "a very dramatic moment," per the Daily Mail.
"We taxied out as normal, lined up, and suddenly began accelerating like a regular take-off, but after gaining quite a lot of speed, something clearly wasn't right," he recalled. "The pilot suddenly slammed on the brakes, extremely hard, and the whole cabin felt the force immediately."
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"There was a sharp maneuver to keep the aircraft on the paved surface, and you could feel how close we were to running out of space," he added. 'Thankfully everyone was safe, but it was definitely one of the most intense situations I've ever experienced on a plane."
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Operations at Brussels Airport continued on as normal following the incident, reported Aerospace Global News.
A spokesperson for Scandinavian Airlines told Air Live that the airline is fully cooperating with Belgian aviation authorities to determine how the incident happened and noted that they planned to have an “internal investigation” on the issue.
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“Safety is our absolute priority,” the airline told Air Live in a statement. “We are currently conducting a thorough internal investigation alongside local authorities to understand the sequence of events.”
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