An Airbus A350 dodges a tornado while landing in Havana

On the afternoon of Sunday (22), thunderstorms developed in the area surrounding Havana, Cuba, causing a waterspout to form near the José Martí International Airport.

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Although the weather phenomenon itself is not unusual, the curious thing was that it occurred while a World2Fly Airbus A350-900 (registration EC-NOI) from Madrid was on final approach to the airport.

The situation resulted in air traffic control instructing the aircraft to perform a maneuver to avoid the funnel cloud in formation, which did not put the operation at risk, but attracted the attention of a significant amount of people present at the airport. The fortunate bystanders had then a chance to film the landing, generating a video quite out of the ordinary.

Jorge Serpa Llorca, present at the terminal, shared with us the video where the maneuver is observed while the high altitude funnel is to the left of the aircraft, and the subsequent landing at 18:27 local time.

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The Cuban Meteorological Institute’s Forecast Center reported the event at 8:15 PM as a «weak tornado,» adding this photograph following the landing of World2fly’s A350 (at the time of the video, the funnel cloud had not touched down).

NOTA METEOROLÓGICA Hora: 8:15 pm.
En la tarde de hoy al suroeste de la capital, ocurrió un débil tornado cerca de las 6 y 33 pm. El tornado fue fotografiado desde el Aeropuerto José Martí, Santiago de las Vegas y la Universidad de Ciencias Informáticas. #ElTiempoEnCuba @InsmetC pic.twitter.com/lDRMlDTHOp

— Centro de Pronósticos, Insmet (@cnp_insmet_cuba) May 23, 2022

According to local media, quoting official sources, the phenomenon only knocked down a few trees but did not cause any extra damage or injuries.