Of all the reasons for a flight delay, Air India could not have seen this one coming. On September 6th, a bunch of ants forced a London-bound Air India flight to be delayed at New Delhi’s IGI airport. The incident happened not long before the aircraft was to depart. Eventually, a replacement aircraft was arranged, and the flight took off after a delay. Let’s find out more.
Unexpected “passengersâ€
Air India flight AI 111 was scheduled to depart at 2 pm local time from New Delhi. The Boeing 787 was in the passenger bay when someone noticed a swarm of ants in the business class section. The airline officials looked into the complaint and decided to replace the aircraft.
After a delay of more than three hours, the flight took off at around 5:20 pm using a replacement 787 with the registration number VT-NAA. Among the passengers on the plane was the Prince of Bhutan Jigme Namgyel Wangchuck. The flight reached London without any further incident, and data from RadarBox.com shows it landed at 9:43 pm local time.
Not the first-of-its-kind incident
This wasn’t the first time when Air India found its business class cabin “invaded†like this. In May, passengers and crew members of an Air India flight flying to Newark, New Jersey from New Delhi noticed a bat in the business class section roughly 20 minutes into the flight.
Unlike the delay on Monday, the incident in May was slightly trickier because the Boeing 777-300ER was already in flight. Loaded with fuel for the 15-hour journey to Newark, the plane had to circle over Delhi for about an hour and a half before reaching a safe maximum landing weight.
Upon landing, the airplane was fumigated to remove the bat, and another 777-300ER was arranged for the passengers.
Similar incidents around the world
Air India isn’t alone when it comes to such bizarre incidents. In June 2019, a woman in a United Airlines flight UA 169 flying from Venice to Newark reported seeing ants crawling on her pillow and entertainment system. The situation escalated when ants were discovered spilling out of a suitcase in the overhead locker of the Boeing 767-300. Coincidently, this too happened in the business class cabin.
The same month, an Air Transat flight between London and Vancouver had to be canceled after insects started falling from overhead lockers. As if straight out of a movie scene, passengers were reportedly ‘screaming in terror’ after inch-long bugs, which looked like brown beetles with wings, started falling from overhead lockers. The Airbus A330 had to be fumigated, and the entire trip was delayed by 24 hours.
In another incident in July this year, a United Airlines flight bound for Newark from Kahului, Hawaii, was delayed slightly when two birds were found inside a ceiling panel.
Reality can sometimes be stranger than fiction. With incidents like these, there’s plenty to inspire scriptwriters for their next airplane thriller. However, with airlines already struggling with the COVID-19 pandemic, here's hoping that we hear less of such delays.