Southwest Airlines plane shot: Family on board describes experience

DALLAS - A Dallas family heading to Indianapolis to visit friends shared their experience after the plane they were on at Love Field was shot.

Southwest Airlines says the shooting happened around 9:50 p.m. on Friday as the plane was getting ready to take off.

A bullet hit the right side of the plane near the cockpit and the entry door.

No one on board was hurt.

The Lee family from north Dallas was on the flight when it happened.

"The pilot came on just before takeoff and said that he had heard a rattling outside of the plane and that they were electing to turn back to the gate so that the mechanical team could check out the plane before we took off," said James Lee.

The family says they didn't hear any noise.

The plane taxied back to the gate where everyone deplaned and boarded a different aircraft for Indianapolis.

During the entire process, the crew kept passengers calm.

"They were very calm. They didn't let us know that anything was amiss. We just thought it was probably a mechanical issue that Southwest missed on a first inspection or something," said Shannon Lee.  

The Lee family says that passengers did not know exactly what happened until they landed, and another passenger shared the news.

"They kept everybody very calm on board, which I think was wise," said Shannon Lee.

It wasn't until the family landed around 2 a.m. that another passenger told them the news that the plane was hit by gunfire.

"It’s pretty shocking and really scary," said Shannon Lee. 

The runway was closed while police investigated.

An investigation is still underway.

Dallas Police haven't said if they believe the gunfire was random or if someone was targeting the plane.

"They didn’t know what they were dealing with, it was a good decision that they went back," said Ron McCallum, an aviation expert and pilot.

He says the pilots on that plane made the right call.

"[The pilot's] job is safety first, always should be, always will be. So taxiing out with that much experience, if you hear a noise that’s unusual in a 737 or whatever the make and model of the aircraft is, you're going to make a decision as the captain whether to continue the flight or return to base," said McCallum. 

The Lee family was concerned that Southwest didn't inform passengers exactly what happened.

If they knew, the family says they wouldn't have gotten on another plane.

"That's the concerning part, I think, is just that they went ahead and chose for us to put us on another plane without our knowledge of the actual events," said Shannon Lee. 

Southwest gave every passenger a voucher to use on a future flight because of the inconvenience.

"This is, I think, hopefully, going to be an isolated event that’s unrelated to anything intentional," said McCallum.

"Southwest Airlines has been in contact with the Customers who were aboard Flight 2494 on Friday night. In addition to offering them vouchers for future travel, we apologized for the inconvenience and stressed that the Safety of our Customers and Crew were our top priority. The replacement flight continued to Indianapolis only after the Dallas Police had ascertained that there was no ongoing threat to public safety and the airport authority had reopened the runway for normal operations," a Southwest spokesperson said in a statement.

No arrests have been made in connection to the shooting.