A United Airlines plane flying from Melbourne, Australia, to Los Angeles declared an emergency and diverted to Brisbane.

“The Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner operating flight UA99 had departed Melbourne on schedule but turned around less than three hours into its journey,” Aviation A2Z reports.

A United Airlines Boeing Dreamliner flying from Melbourne to Los Angeles has declared an emergency mid-flight and is now diverting to Brisbane. pic.twitter.com/DcfHy62IWW

— Shadow of Ezra (@ShadowofEzra) April 11, 2025

Per Aviation A2Z:

The aircraft, registered as N29989, issued a squawk code 7700 indicating an emergency before landing in Brisbane.

United Airlines confirmed the diversion with Simple Flying was due to a medical emergency involving a passenger, with affected travelers being rebooked on later flights and provided accommodation.

According to FlightRadar24 data, United flight UA99 is a regularly scheduled transpacific service connecting Melbourne, Australia with Los Angeles, California.

“On April 11th, United flight 99 from Melbourne to Los Angeles diverted to Brisbane to address a medical issue with a passenger. We have rebooked customers on a later flight and are providing hotel accommodation and meal vouchers,” a United Airlines spokesperson told Simple Flying. 

#UA99, Melbourne-Los Angeles squawking 7700 and diverting to Brisbane. https://t.co/w8UEDXNMRm pic.twitter.com/TIJlB715Lq

— Flightradar24 (@flightradar24) April 11, 2025

Simple Flying reports:

After turning around southwest of New Caledonia, the flight returned to Australia. However, with the nature of the emergency clearly being urgent, there was no time to go all the way back to Melbourne. Instead, the crew of the flight opted to divert to Brisbane, which is situated on the east coast of Australia in Queensland. The flight touched down there 90 minutes later, at around 14:00 local time.

At the time of writing just over eight hours later, tracking data from Flightradar24 suggests that the aircraft operating United Airlines flight UA99, a Boeing 787-9 ‘Dreamliner’ registered as N29989, has yet to continue its journey back to the US.

A key concern in this regard could be limits pertaining to crew hours, and, as Brisbane is not a United base, it isn’t likely to have a replacement crew there on standby.