At Los Angeles International Airport on Saturday morning, Delta Airline Flight 1714 was unable to reach Seattle in time. The fault of an “unruly passenger”, explained a representative of the American airline on Monday. As the plane was leaving its boarding gate to prepare to go to the take-off runway, one of the travelers broke down and wanted to get out of the plane using the emergency exits.
“The plane was taxiing for takeoff when the passenger exited the plane. He was initially restrained by Delta personnel before being arrested by law enforcement., informed the spokesperson of the company. In the meantime, he will still have managed to open the door located at the rear of the aircraft, instantly causing the deployment of the slides that the pilots had just armed.
In the device, another traveler was able to explain the situation in more detail, with supporting photos that she shared on Twitter. “As my flight was leaving the gate in Los Angeles, a man rushed to the back of the plane and opened the door. The stewardesses tried to stop him, but he deployed the slide and jumped out”.
Hello former colleagues! I was on this plane! pic.twitter.com/7f5ZWixNnH
— Gillian Sheldon (@gilliansheldon) March 25, 2023
FBI contacted
Delta Airlines flight 1714 was nearly four hours late in Seattle. It must be said that the passengers had to wait on the plane for long minutes before being transferred to another aircraft of the company. Triggering the slides then requires very special attention – like triggering the airbags on a car, this is an emergency procedure used in the event of a water landing or a problem landing a plane (start of fire for example).
The reasons for the action of the fugitive passenger are not yet clear. Neither the company nor the Federal Aviation Administration gave any additional information on his attitude. Whether it’s anxiety on the plane or some other problem, we only know that the FBI has been informed of the incident, announced NBC News.
Earlier in the month, on March 21, it was at Gatwick airport, not far from London in England, that a Wizz Air plane also triggered a slide. In this case, it was not an incident indicting a passenger, but a simple bug of the device (an Airbus A321), at the time of its landing. Seeing the central door slide on the left side of the deployed fuselage, the firefighters quickly joined the aircraft, putting all the passengers on alert.
