On April 14, 2006, flying American Flight 1372, I was coming back from a business trip in Arkansas .

We had just taken off for McAllen, Texas, from DFW on American Airlines. The plane had just reached cruising altitude, and suddenly there was a very LOUD BANG on the right side of the aircraft.

I was sitting in the emergency exit row. The flight attendant quickly approached us, and explained to all of us in the emergency row to quickly read the card regarding the procedure to remove the doors. Then the pilot made an announcement that we would have to return to DFW because the plane had just experienced am "engine malfunction". 

 

The plane then had to manuver from it's altitude to quickly land the plane, and to do this, the pilot put the plane into a downward spiral, which made everyone on board very uncomfortable, It honestly felt as if the plane was going to crash! 

 

We were given instructions for a crash landing. We were told, when given the word, to put our heads between our legs and get into the crash position.

On the turn around and the final approach, you could see the fire trucks on the runway. I felt like I was living a scene from some stupid movie that had a scene with an airplane crashing.

Well, we touched down safely then were ferried to an emergency runway where they checked for fire on the starboard engine. They gave us instructions
for the escape shutes, but luckily, we did not have to do that.

We then taxied to the gate, then all the buzzers went off for the flight attendants. in the front of the plane, some lady apparently had a panic attack! It took an agonizing 20 minutes for the fire suited medics to get into the aircraft. If she had had a heart attack, she would have been dead. 

We could see the flight attendant trying to get the rear emergency door open. She could NOT do it. According to one of the pilots, he stated "that since they had to get down so quickly, they could not decompress the aircraft fully."

We never heard anything from American Airlines about free drinks, vouchers, etc. Nothing was heard from American management. But, the pilot apologized for the delay on the intercom numerous times.

When we finally arrived in McAllen, no one from the McAllen American Airlines office was there to greet us.