Created Thursday, Jul 9th 2026 10:50Z, last updated Thursday, Jul 9th 2026 10:50Z
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.
