Alaska Airlines plane aborts takeoff to avoid collision with Southwest

An Alaska Airlines plane aborted takeoff on the runway at Nashville International Airport in the US state of Tennessee on Thursday to avoid a possible collision with a Southwest Airlines jet, the airline said.

Alaska Airlines Flight 369, a Boeing 737 MAX 9 with 176 passengers and six crew on board, aborted takeoff at around 9:15 a.m. ET due to a possible traffic conflict after receiving takeoff clearance from air traffic control, the airline said.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said that Southwest Airlines Flight 2029, a Boeing 737-700, was cleared to cross the end of the same runway and that the agency is investigating the incident.

Alaska's pilots immediately pulled the emergency brake to prevent the incident from escalating, the airline added. The plane was supposed to fly to Seattle and the passengers were rebooked onto another plane.

The FAA and Alaska said the tires on the 737 MAX 9 burst during braking.

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Southwest had no immediate comment. Alaska said maintenance technicians in Nashville were inspecting the plane.

Last year, a series of near-misses raised concerns about flight safety in the United States and the strain on understaffed air traffic control.

FAA Administrator Mike Whitaker told reporters Wednesday that the number of serious runway incursion incidents has dropped by more than 50 percent, but “we continue to work on the problem by creating more technology for air traffic controllers and more technology in the arrival facilities.”