A passenger plane operated by Norwegian Air Shuttle made an unscheduled landing at Vienna-Schwechat Airport on Monday while en route from Norway to Croatia.
The Boeing 737-800, registration LN-NHA, was operating flight DY1922 from Oslo-Gardermoen to Dubrovnik when, after approximately two hours of flight time, the crew noticed a crack in the cockpit windshield. The pilots reported the incident to air traffic control, requested a priority landing, and initiated a descent towards the Austrian capital.
The passengers on board were informed of the planned stopover before the aircraft landed safely in Vienna. As confirmed by the airline Norwegian, the damage involved the cockpit glass. The aircraft underwent a technical inspection on the ground while the airline arranged for a replacement aircraft and crew to transport the passengers to their original destination in Dalmatia. Specialist technicians are investigating the exact cause of the crack.
Aviation safety experts point out that the windshields of modern commercial aircraft are made of multi-layered, reinforced safety glass. In most cases, a crack only affects the outer layer and does not lead to a drop in cabin pressure, meaning there was no immediate danger to the aircraft's structure. Common causes of such damage include bird strikes, micrometeorites, small particles in the air, or thermal stresses due to malfunctions in the integrated windshield heating system.
This incident is not the first of its kind for Norwegian. In the past, the airline has experienced similar incidents involving cracks in cockpit windows, leading to course deviations, including on flights from Oslo to London and on a route to Nice. While standardized safety protocols are effectively in place in such cases, these unplanned diversions regularly result in flight delays and additional logistical challenges for the operators.