A Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) flight bound for Islamabad was delayed by nearly eight hours after a woman accidentally opened the emergency exit while trying to get to the bathroom. Luckily, this appears to have happened while the plane was being boarded while on the tarmac, and not mid-flight.
According to The Independent, the flight was ultimately grounded in Manchester before continuing to its destination. To be fair, we’ve all reached the point of no return and had to rush to the toilet during a flight, but her call of nature resulted in a major headache for everyone involved. Opening the emergency door caused one of the plane’s inflatable slide to activate, resulting in an immediate removal of all passengers aboard the plane.
When things like this happen, the airline can choose to take the plane out of service to re-install the slide, or the plane can be sent on its way with only the other slide on board. PIA chose the latter option, but because the emergency exit capacity is cut in half, only half of the plane’s original passenger load was allowed to fly. As a result, nearly 40 people lost their seats on the plane and had to be rebooked onto other departing flights.
As you can imagine, the story doesn’t end there. While the airline removed all of the people from the plane and rebooked several onto other flights, they apparently couldn’t hash out a solid plan to get all of the luggage to the passengers’ final destinations. One passenger, tweeting with the name “Sleeping Beauty” complained that the bags were not given to passengers before leaving Manchester and did not make the trip to Islamabad, saying that “A lot of us don’t even have clothes to wear here.”