A tattoo artist gives passengers tattoos on an Atlantic Airways flight, then calls it a ‘fun little gimmick’

A TikTok user, Mikaela Nilsson (@mikaelavnilsson), who was on an Atlantic Airways flight posted a video showing a tattoo artist working on someone mid-flight. She wrote in the overlay, “Never seen snakes on a plane, but I have seen this.” The footage shows a small crowd gathered while the artist draws a tattoo on someone during the flight.

“Apparently tattooing at 10 km altitude on a plane is also something I can cross off the list now,” she further wrote. The tattoo artist identified himself on Instagram as Jones Larsen and posted photos of himself doing tattoos on several people mid-flight.

Larsen told followers the idea was not planned. He said, “The idea came up spontaneously on the flight home after tattooing had already been part of the Bareen Training Tour in Fuerteventura. Bareen had chartered the entire plane, so it was a closed group.”

He had permission

While people can be denied entry for having a tattoo, this artist apparently had permission from the flight crew to execute the task. Larsen mentioned, “We spoke with the flight crew beforehand and only went ahead with their permission and during cruise, following their instructions.”

According to him, he also took care of proper hygiene during the process. He wrote, “I’ve been tattooing professionally for around 15 years, so we took hygiene seriously — professional equipment, single-use materials, gloves, barriers, and cleaning before and after.” He also added that “no alcohol was involved and nobody paid for the tattoos.”

People like to have weird tattoos, but this one was just a “fun little gimmick that ended up getting way more attention than we ever expected,” said the artist. In 2022, there was another similar incident when a tattoo artist, Asher (@luckyboytattoos), gave his seatmate a tattoo.

In a video posted on his account, he can be seen tattooing the word ‘hello’ on his seatmate’s arm. However, airplanes are a pretty bad place to get a tattoo, as they quickly become dirty with hundreds of different people interacting with it on a daily basis.

According to the Transportation Security Administration, tattoo guns are allowed in both carry-on and checked luggage. It advises travelers to keep devices with lithium metal or lithium-ion batteries in a carry-on. Ink and needles can be brought if they meet TSA standards.