Plane Forced to Land Because of Globe-trotting Rat
Forget about snakes on a plane. What you really need to worry about are rats. (Photo: Thinkstock)
An Air India flight was forced to change its trajectory and return back to Mumbai after a rat was discovered on board the plane mid-flight. According to the BBC the plane was somewhere over Iran when it turned around.
One passenger mentioned that they spied the varmint. Flight staff searched the plane but could not find it.
The AP reported that “though the rat was not found, the pilot returned to Mumbai keeping passenger safety in mind. The aircraft would be fumigated and checked before it is returned to service, a spokesman said.”
“No rat was found in the original aircraft,” airline spokesman G.P. Rao said in a statement to CNN.
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Still, the decision to turn the plane around was due to the fact that rats have been known to gnaw their way through mechanical wires, causing major problems for aircraft.
The 240 passengers landed safely in Mumbai and were later flown to London on a separate plane.
According to CNN, this was not Air India’s first rat problem.
“One of their aircraft was forced to return to New Delhi during a flight to Milan in July because of a rat report.”
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