Emirates Boeing 777 pilots declare fuel emergency in Miami
An Emirates Boeing 777-300ER from Dubai to Miami declared a mayday fuel emergency after 17+ hours aloft and two aborted landings due to wind shear and a runway obstruction, landing safely on the third attempt
ATT Desk Report
Emirates flight EK213 operates from Dubai (DXB) to Miami (MIA). The 7,845-mile flight is flown by a Boeing 777-300ER. On Sunday, May 17, 2026, the flight was scheduled to depart at 2:15AM local time and arrive at 10:00AM local time, with a total block time of 15hr45min, reports One Mile at a Time.
This is a very long flight under normal circumstances. On top of that, at the moment, flights are in some cases taking by-passes to avoid certain airspace in the Middle East, potentially adding to flight time.
Unfortunately, due to low visibility and wind shear, the plane had to perform a go around. At this point, the Emirates pilots requested to divert to Fort Lauderdale (FLL). However, the controller told them that the weather was still better for runway 12 at Miami. So, the pilots informed the controller that they were declaring minimum fuel, and requested an approach for runway 12.
At this point, the pilots declared emergency fuel, which gives the plane top priority for landing. This included a “mayday, mayday, mayday” call, which is the most serious emergency a pilot can declare. The pilots finally managed to land on their third attempt.
They touched down at 11:08AM, over an hour after the scheduled arrival time, despite taking off from Dubai around half an hour early.
In fact, it appears that the pilots had quite a bit of bad luck attempting to land in Miami after already battling strong headwinds across the Atlantic Ocean that made the flight longer than normal.
Emirates only resumed flights between Dubai and Miami on May 1 after suspending the service for two months due to the war in Iran.
The plane circled around and lined up to land on Runway 12. Everything was looking good as the land came within less than 100 feet of landing, until the Air Traffic Control tower at Miami International noticed that another plane hadn’t vacated the runway in time.
