A BOEING passenger plane almost crashed into the sea after plummeting 1,400ft in only 18 seconds shortly after takeoff.
The United Airlines Boeing 777-200 came within 800ft of the Pacific Ocean as it fell from the sky off the coast of Maui, Hawaii on its route to San Francisco.
The previously unreported December 18 incident is further fuelling fears around the major safety and operational issues taking place in US aviation and involving Boeing jets recently.
United Airlines Flight UA1722 took off from Kahului Airport, Maui in stormy weather and climbed to an altitude of 2,200ft before it rapidly started to descend.
The flight plummeted to 775ft bringing it frighteningly close to the ocean before it quickly recovered and resumed its climb to 33,000ft, reported The Air Current.
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The whole incident lasted 45 seconds and passengers had to withstand the forces of a plane descending at a speed of 8,600ft per minute.
The plane went on to safely arrive in San Francisco early.
It is not known whether air traffic controllers noticed the terrifying incident in Maui and released recordings between pilots and air traffic controllers do not mention the event.
A United spokesperson confirmed the incident took place and claimed that a formal internal safety report was filed by the pilots and the aircraft was inspected after the journey.
Between them, the pilots had 25,000 flying hours.
"United then closely coordinated with the FAA and ALPA on an investigation that ultimately resulted in the pilots receiving additional training. Safety remains our highest priority," the spokesperson told The Air Current.
United did not report the incident to the National Transportation Safety Board.
The scary incident had flown under the radar until recently, despite the fact that on that same day, 25 people were injured due to severe turbulence on a Hawaiian Airlines flight bound from Honolulu to Phoenix.
On top of these incidents, there are also two active investigations facing major US airlines.
On January 13, a runway incursion at JFK International Airport brought a departing Delta Airlines flight within 1,400ft of a an American Airlines flight.
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An extremely deadly incident was avoided just in time with the air traffic controller screaming: "S***! F***! Delta 1943, cancel takeoff clearance! Delta 1943, cancel takeoff clearance!"
Only a few weeks later on February 4, a FedEx freighter plane came within 100ft of a Southwest Airlines passenger plane that was travelling down the runway at Austin's International Airport.
The FedEx plane aborted its landing at the last minute, while the Southwest jet managed to take off safely.
Analysts believe that it was only thanks to quick thinking on behalf of the FedEx pilot that the second near-deadly collision in less than a month was avoided.
The dangerous US aviation news follows another near-disaster on January 10, when a Qatar Airways 787 Boeing plane came within seconds of hitting the waves of the Persian Gulf.
The flight took off from Hamad International Airport in Doha bound for Denmark when the very close call took place.
The plane reportedly fell 1000ft within 24 seconds, while the first officer was flying manually without help from the automated flight director.
The captain quickly took charge and rapidly pulled the aircraft up, avoiding disaster from only 800ft above the ocean.
The Air Current reports that these incidents - which should be extremely rare - are "serious warnings from a fragile system".
"The spate of recent incidents highlights both the redundancy of safety measures built into commercial aviation and the possibility for catastrophic accidents in spite of them."
