Comedian and political commentator Jimmy Dore revealed he was a passenger on a chaotic Southwest Airlines flight where the pilot had to aggressively avoid a mid-air collision with a Hawker Hunter.

Southwest Flight NOSE DIVES 500 FT to Avoid Hawk Hunter

"Just now on SW Flight #1496 Burbank to Las Vegas. Pilot had to dive aggressively to avoid midair collision over Burbank airport," Dore said.

"Myself & Plenty of people flew out of their seats & bumped heads on ceiling, a flight attendant needed medical attention. Pilot said his collision warning went off & he needed to avoid plane coming at us. Wow," he continued.

Dore posted a video representation of the incident:

"The Crew of Southwest Flight 1496 responded to two onboard traffic alerts Friday afternoon while climbing out of Burbank, Cal., requiring them to climb and descend to comply with the alerts. The flight continued to Las Vegas, where it landed uneventfully. Southwest is engaged with the Federal Aviation Administration to further understand the circumstances. No injuries were immediately reported by Customers, but two Flight Attendants are being treated for injuries. We appreciate the professionalism of our Flight Crew and Flight Attendants in responding to this event. Nothing is more important to Southwest than the Safety of our Customers and Employees," Southwest Airlines said in a statement, according to Breaking Aviation News & Videos.

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NBC News has more:

Passenger Steve Ulasewicz told NBC Los Angeles that the incident happened about eight minutes into the flight and passengers felt “a significant drop for about two seconds,” which he attributed to turbulence.

“Then maybe like three seconds after that the plane was in a freefall” for around eight to 10 seconds, he told the station by phone. “People were screaming. You know, it was pandemonium. People thought the plane was going down.”

The plane continued on to Las Vegas and landed without any further incident, Southwest Airlines said.

“No injuries were immediately reported by Customers, but two Flight Attendants are being treated for injuries,” it said.

A spokesperson for Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas said that medical personnel responded to the gate and one injured person was transported to a hospital.

FAA records show that the Hawker Hunter is registered to a company in Newark, Delaware. NBC News has emailed the company to confirm that the Hawker Hunter was its aircraft.

“About 10 minutes into the flight, we plummeted pretty far, and I looked around, and everyone was like, 'OK, that's normal',” another passenger said.

“Then, within two seconds, it felt like the ride Tower of Terror, where we fell 20 to 30 feet in the air. The screaming, it was terrifying. We really thought we were plummeting to a plane crash," she added.

Check it out:

Fox News provided additional details:

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One flight attendant was dazed after hitting her head, passengers said. Another flight attendant announced he was quitting.

Following the dramatic drop, the pilot came on the intercom and said the plane almost collided with another plane, and they had lost air traffic control signal.

"It was absolutely terrifying," Burdi said. "I just remember him saying, ‘What just happened was we almost collided with another plane, and I had to make the emergency attempt to go under because we lost service with the air traffic controller.’"

 

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