Delta Airline passenger opens exit door, activates emergency slide before takeoff

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By Sarah Rumpf, Fox News

March 26, 2023 | 12:37am

A Delta Airlines passenger on a flight from Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) on Saturday was arrested for opening supposedly an emergency exit door on an airplane and causes the airplane’s emergency slide to be activated before takeoff.

According to Los Angeles Airport Police, at approximately 10 am EST., an unidentified passenger, wearing a striped red and navy blue sweater with black pants, rushed in front of the plane as it was pulling away from the gate and asked about the flight. attendant, “what do I do now?”

Passengers FOX 11 was told the flight attendant insisted the man sit down, but he ran from the Delta Air Lines flight attendant and went to the plane’s emergency exit doors, turned the latch, opened the door, and slid down the deploy emergency slide.

The plane was forced to stop, and passengers told FOX 11 the man jumped into the back of a baggage cart, where baggage workers lowered him until LAX Police got there.

“He is being transported to a local hospital for a mental evaluation,” Sgt. Devin Feldman said.

Los Angeles Airport Police said the FBI had been notified of the incident.

“The Airport Police responded and detained the passenger for further investigation. Due to the circumstances, the FBI has been notified,” Los Angeles Airport Police told Fox News Digital in a statement.

“Delta flight 1714 operating from Los Angeles to Seattle returned to the gate due to an unruly passenger. The aircraft was taxiing for flight when the passenger exited the aircraft and was initially detained by Delta staff before he was arrested by local law enforcement. Delta Air Lines said in a statement to Fox News Digital. “Customers are being welcomed back to a new aircraft, and we apologize for the inconvenience and delay in their plans on the journey.”

“Delta is great. The flight attendants were amazing,” said Gillian Sheldon, who was on the plane. She told FOX 11 that everything happened so quickly that no one had any time to react.

“You always say to yourself, when you see these things on TV, that I’m going to do this or that, but in reality, it’s so fast, there’s no way to react,” he said. “Just glad it didn’t happen while we were in the air, or it would have been a completely different outcome.”

Following the incident, passengers on the Delta Air Lines plane were evacuated and transferred to another plane. The flight was bound for LAX to Seattle, Washington and according to FlightAware.com the flight was delayed for 3 hours due to the incident.