Passengers Sick – Plane Makes Emergency Landing In Florida
March 5, 2008 by national
Filed under Incident Reports
UPDATE: The ill passengers turned to be family members who had eaten together. The CDC determined that their illness was not airborne and not contagious, CDC representative Lola Russell said. Something the passengers ate or drank must have caused them the illness, she added. They remain hospitalized until their health state improves.
Original Story
A plane en route from the Dominican Republic to Canada made an emergency landing Tuesday night in Florida after passengers complained of being sick, officials said.
Eight passengers were taken to a hospital as a precaution after Air Transat Flight 477 landed at Fort Lauderdale/Hollywood International Airport about 11 p.m. ET, the Broward County Sheriff’s Office said.
Officials said they don’t know what sickened the passengers who left Punta Cana in eastern Dominican Republic about 9:30 p.m.
“Due to the multiple symptoms and unknown illness,” the sheriff’s office said, authorities alerted local health authorities, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the sheriff’s office’s homeland security unit and federal customs officials.
She said that officials were not sure what caused the illness but that it appeared to have been something the passengers ate or drank. The passengers’ illness did not seem to be contagious, Russell said.
