Flying can be terrifying, especially if you’re anxious about being suspended 35,000 feet in the air, but this news is horrifying and tragic for absolutely everyone.
On Monday, Jan. 6, 2025, two bodies were discovered in a JetBlue plane’s wheel well. Flight 1801 left New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport and, after it landed at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport, a gate technician discovered the bodies. According to CNN, an anonymous tip shared with the radio of the Broward County Sheriff’s Office explained that the technician “noticed two males who appear to be Signal 7, advised they are not moving in the landing gear area.”
The only question right now is, um, why? How did this happen? How do pilots and flight attendants and all the other people who work for an airline and at the airport have no idea that two people are in the wheel well of a plane? JetBlue’s official statement reads, “This is a heartbreaking situation, and we are committed to working closely with authorities to support their efforts to understand how this occurred.”
A similar gut-wrenching situation happened recently. A body was discovered in a United Airlines plane on Dec. 25, 2024. According to The Associated Press, United flight 202 took off from Chicago and when it got to Kahului Airport, people realized there was a body in the wheel well. The Maui Police Department explained it was “actively investigating” but no news has been shared since then. In both of these cases, the identities of the people are unknown.
As USA Today reported, sometimes people will hide in the nose wells or wheel wells of a plane in order to be on the flight undetected. But, as USA Today pointed out, this is incredibly dangerous. The wheels of the plane can kill someone and people can also die from not getting enough oxygen and also getting too cold. It seems likely that the two people in the wheel well were killed by the elements. However, any scenario is terrible to imagine.
I’m absolutely not the only person completely freaked out by this… and I wasn’t fond of flying to begin with. The next time I fly, I’m not going to be able to stop thinking about this tragedy, and I’m sure others will be the same. Between an American Airlines plane coming close to a mountain and United telling a woman she doesn’t actually have a seat, there are so many reasons to be worried about air travel that are more than your run-of-the-mill flying anxieties.
If the two bodies were discovered when the flight was over, was there no security check beforehand? It’s impossible not to think that airlines need to do something about this lax security, and fast. As CNN reported in Dec. 2024, the Federal Aviation Administration explains that people hide in a plane’s wheel wells more than any other method of hiding on a flight. A woman got on a Delta Air Lines plane without a ticket but she was found before the plane took off. The FAA also explained that, from 1947 to 2012, 96 people were stowaways on flights.
Sure, airports are always packed with stressed-out travelers, and that’s even worse during Christmas time (as proven by the Netflix movie Carry-On). But is that any reason not to look out for everyone’s safety? The fact that this happens so often makes me feel unsettled and freaked out. Airlines need to do more than simply say they’re looking into the situation and then offer no details once the news has broken. If they’re aware that this is a common problem, continuing to let it happen is unacceptable. I’m no aviation expert, but if people can get into the wheel wells, shouldn’t checking every part of the plane be common practice before takeoff?
Published: Jan 7, 2025 01:07 pm