Fixing WestJet plane in Sint Maarten likely ‘very difficult project’: aviation experts

Members of the flight crew are shown near a WestJet plane after a hard landing at Princess Juliana International Airport in Sint Maarten in this Sunday, Sept. 7, 2025, handout photo. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Handout - Government of Sint Maarten

Repairing a WestJet plane that landed roughly in Sint Maarten on the weekend and shut down the Caribbean island’s airport for a day will be a challenge, say aviation experts.

Videos of WestJet Flight WS2276 from Toronto flooded social media earlier this week, depicting the moments of the aircraft’s final descent over bright blue waters near Maho Beach before it landed roughly on its right landing gear and came to a stop on the runway of Princess Juliana International Airport on Sunday afternoon.

Though it was removed on Monday afternoon from the area of runway where it came to a stop, the Boeing 737-800 plane remains dormant on the airport’s tarmac, awaiting repair or further movement.

Fixing a plane on the small and isolated island located approximately 300 kilometres east of Puerto Rico may prove to be a “difficult project,” said Keith Mackey, an aviation expert and former pilot.

“There’s not much material or talent down there to do it, so everything would have to be brought in probably from Canada, the parts and everything else,” Mackey said.

“So they’ll have to make a careful determination as to the extent of the damage versus what is going to be cost-effective.”

The next step is to move the plane to a safe facility that is protected from wind and water and equipped with sufficient power and materials to assess whether it can be salvaged, said Mackey.

If the plane cannot be fixed, Mackey said, it may need to be scrapped.

Repairs to the aircraft would go beyond fixing parts that were broken upon impact and resetting the inflatable slides that were let out, said Doug Perovic, an engineering professor at the University of Toronto.

“They’re going to need to check and see whether there’s any other collateral damage to the aircraft and to the structure of the fuselage,” Perovic said.

He added that extensive, non-destructive evaluation techniques similar to those used in medicine, such as X-rays and ultrasounds, will be used to inspect the plane.

The Transportation Safety Board of Canada announced Monday that it was sending a team of investigators to the island to assess what caused the aircraft to land the way it did.

The two main areas of investigation by the safety board include looking into what caused the crash and what sort of damage the aircraft sustained, said Perovic.

To understand why the crash happened, investigators will use flight data and cockpit recordings contained in the plane’s black boxes.

“What’s fortunate here is that it wasn’t a serious crash, so everything is available,” Perovic said, adding that it shortens the time of the investigation.

However, he added that the black boxes need to be interrogated with proper equipment that likely doesn’t exist on the small island, so they will need to be brought back to Canada.

Information contained in the black boxes is usually released by the safety board in its preliminary investigation, which can be expected in the coming weeks, Perovic said.

Early determinations will also be made if there are issues with the aircraft that could affect the rest of the aircraft fleet owned and operated by WestJet, he said.

“If it is a serious problem, then they would have to ground the whole fleet.”

As for the final, comprehensive report produced by Canada’s safety board, that could take up to a year.

As a former airline pilot who has flown into the airport several times before, Mackey said he observed nothing unusual about the plane’s approach to the runway.

“I viewed video of the airplane landing and they seemed to do a good job. The approach seemed normal. They weren’t flying too high or too low,” he said.

“I think the damage was probably caused by some sort of mechanical event, though I don’t know for sure.”

WestJet has said it is co-operating with local authorities and will provide updates when more information is available, though the company hasn’t released any new details since the weekend.

There were no serious injuries among the 164 passengers aboard the WestJet flight, though three were taken for medical assessment after a safe evacuation.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 9, 2025.