Two our bodies had been found within the touchdown gear compartment of a JetBlue aircraft on Monday after a flight from New York to Fort Lauderdale, Fla., the airline stated in an announcement on Tuesday.
JetBlue Flight 1801 departed Kennedy Airport in New York at 7:49 p.m. Monday and landed at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood Worldwide Airport at 11:10 p.m., based on flight tracker information. The our bodies had been found throughout a routine post-flight upkeep evaluation of the aircraft, the airline stated.
Paramedics pronounced the 2 individuals lifeless on the scene, based on the Broward County Sheriff’s Workplace. It was unclear how lengthy the individuals had been within the touchdown gear compartment.
The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which manages Kennedy Airport, didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark about how the people might have gained entry to the plane.
At a information convention on Tuesday afternoon, Carey Codd, a public info officer with the sheriff’s workplace, stated the 2 people had been each males however stated their identities weren’t but identified. He stated the Broward County Medical Examiner’s Workplace would conduct autopsies to find out the reason for their deaths.
Touchdown gear compartments, positioned below an plane’s wings and on the entrance of the aircraft, have lengthy been utilized by individuals trying to journey undetected on airplanes. The airline didn’t say whether or not the 2 individuals who had been discovered lifeless on Monday had been stowaways.
Such makes an attempt to cover in touchdown gear compartments have confirmed lethal up to now. The compartments open and shut upon takeoff and touchdown to deploy and retract wheels and different touchdown elements, and different stowaways have fallen to their deaths from the openings, typically touchdown in public areas alongside flight paths.
Those that can keep inside the compartment threat being crushed by touchdown gear when it’s withdrawn again into the plane, together with different hazards, together with extreme temperatures, stress adjustments and lack of oxygen. Many stowaways die of hypothermia.
As just lately as Christmas Day, a physique was found in a wheel properly of a United Airways flight from Chicago to Hawaii. In 2023, a person was discovered alive in a touchdown gear compartment after a business flight from Algeria to France, although he was affected by extreme hypothermia.
An investigation was underway on Tuesday to find out the identities of the 2 people found in Fort Lauderdale and the way they may have accessed the plane earlier than it departed from New York, JetBlue stated.
“It is a heartbreaking scenario, and we’re dedicated to working intently with authorities to help their efforts to know how this occurred,” the airline stated.
