'Biohazard Issue': Passenger's Diarrhea Forces Delta Flight To Abandon Journey Midway For Clean-Up

A Delta airlines transatlantic flight bound for Spain's Barcelona was reportedly forced to abort its journey and return to the US' Atlanta last week after one of the passengers on board came down with diarrhea 'all the way through the airplane'. According to media reports, Delta flight 194 was over the US state of Virginia when its crew decided to head back to its origin on Friday.

The situation was described as a "biohazard" issue by the pilot in his conversation with air traffic control (ATC), as per a purported transcript of the exchange shared by X (formerly Twitter) user '@thenewarea51'.

"Divert to ATL — passenger diarrhea all over a/c (shorthand for aircraft) — biohazard," read the transcript. "It's just a biohazard issue, we had a passenger who had diarrhea all the way through the airplane so they want us to come back to Atlanta," a man assumed to be one of the pilots of the Airbus A350 being operated by Delta was heard saying to the ATC in an audio recording published alongside the transcript.

A Delta Airlines Airbus A350 turned around back to Atlanta Friday night because of diarrhea throughout the airplane from a passenger and it’s a biohazard. 👀🥴

The FAA flight strip for DL194 was posted to Reddit (📷xStang05x) Also a passenger posted here asking why her son’s… pic.twitter.com/VWbkB47wF1

— Thenewarea51 (@thenewarea51) September 3, 2023

The audio transmission between the pilots and air traffic control was reportedly recorded from a website that provides live air traffic control broadcasts from air traffic control towers.

Without dwelling into much details, Delta confirmed that there had been a "medical issue" on board the airliner which prompted its return to Atlanta for a clean-up. "Delta Flight 194 from Atlanta to Barcelona returned to Atlanta following an onboard medical issue," the airline's statement published by Insider website said.

"Our teams worked as quickly and safely as possible to thoroughly clean the airplane and get our customers to their final destination. We sincerely apologise to our customers for the delay and inconvenience to their travel plans," the air carrier added.

Upon its landing in Atlanta, the plane was cleaned and flew to Barcelona the next day, BBC reported.