Before boarding a flight from Orlando to Los Angeles, Isaias Hernandez completed a health checklist by United Airlines, claiming that he had not been diagnosed with COVID-19 and that he had no symptoms of the disease in the previous two weeks.
But during the flight, 69-year-old Angeleno collapsed. Three passengers gave him CPR in the aisle of the plane for nearly an hour, and the flight was diverted to Louisiana, where Hernandez was pronounced dead. In the coroner’s report, the cause was mentioned as ‘acute respiratory failure, COVID-19’.
The incident on December 14 illustrates the shortcomings in the systems intended to prevent people from bringing the coronavirus on board commercial flights and possibly spreading it to the people packed around them. And that happened when the air travel of the holiday skyrocketed. In the days around Christmas, more than a million passengers boarded planes almost daily, reaching 1.3 million last Sunday – the most since March.
US airlines boast low protocols meant to protect passengers from the virus, including increased cleaning of aircraft cabins and the requirement for passengers to wear face masks unless they are eating or drinking. Almost all also require passengers to fill out a health declaration before boarding. But the only consequences of lying on the statement or refusing to wear a mask in the plane is to ban the airline if it is caught.
How often people with COVID-19 aircraft are impossible to know.
Federal regulations require airline pilots to report any deaths or illnesses aboard interstate and international flights to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and in March the CDC updated its guidance to remind pilots of their duty. But on Thursday, the CDC told The Times that it did not keep track of the pilots’ reports. The U.S. Department of Transportation and the Federal Aviation Administration have said they also do not track COVID-19 cases on aircraft.
Flight attendants are asked to be on the lookout for symptoms – coughing, sneezing, high body temperature – but airline representatives say they cannot assess every passenger.
Only a few airlines, such as Avianca and Frontier, take the temperature of each passenger before boarding.
An employee of Avianca at Los Angeles International Airport takes traveler Eva Zapata’s temperature before a flight in November.
(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
Some U.S. airports, including Los Angeles International Airport, take the extra step of using thermal cameras to measure people’s temperature as they enter the terminal, but pilots may sign up.
The CDC last January launched an enhanced screening program for international passengers arriving from certain countries to the U.S. with widespread transmission of the virus. But it ends the program in November and concludes that the attempt failed, in part because COVID-19 has too many symptoms that are also common to other diseases; travelers can mask their symptoms to prevent detection; and even asymptomatic travelers can still carry and spread the virus.
Advocates for passenger rights, unions and academics say the U.S. Department of Transportation must adopt uniform standards for air safety, including a mask mandate applied with steep fines. They also call on the federal agency to put more resources into contact detection of known cases and improve access to fast and reliable COVID-19 tests that passengers can take before a flight.
“Without health protection rules by [the Transportation Department], COVID will continue to distribute air travel, ”said Paul Hudson, president of Flyersrights.org, an airline group for passenger rights with more than 60,000 members.
The Trump administration has been reluctant to draft airline investigations and safety requirements, but has preferred to have each carrier and airport draw up and implement their own individual policies.
“Unless the message comes from above, it’s really hard to take action,” said Jan L. Jones, a professor of hospitality and tourism at the University of New Haven.
The tragedy during the United Airlines flight on December 14 was only the last incident in which a passenger boarded a plane, despite the COVID-19 symptoms or positive testing for the coronavirus.
In late November, a Hawaiian couple who tested positive for the virus were told to isolate themselves in San Francisco, but instead boarded a plane to Kauai, where they were arrested for the reckless threat. the police said.
Several other incidents involving passengers showing COVID-19 symptoms on flights have been reported to an aviation safety database operated by NASA. The reports in the database are submitted anonymously by pilots and flight attendants, with the exact dates and airlines ‘names omitted to protect the tipsters’ privacy.
The database has been set up so that NASA can report safety issues to aviation manufacturers and operators without reimbursing the employees of the companies for marking the problems.
According to a report in the database submitted in October, the pilot of a commercial flight was alerted to a female passenger who complained of extreme pain while the plane was at altitude. The pilot offered to direct the flight to the nearest airport to get immediate medical attention, but she said she felt better after an EMT gave oxygen on the flight.
“While receiving attention in the aircraft, the passenger said that she had been exposed to COVID for the past three days,” the pilot said in the report, which contains few other details.
On a flight in May, a pilot reported that he had been notified by an air hostess that a male passenger was’ coughing, sneezing, not wearing a mask, and that he was refusing to wear a mask, despite repeated attempts by her to give him one. ‘ The plane had just pulled away from the gate, the pilot reported.
The air hostess also said other passengers were starting to panic because the cough passenger got up about five times to use the toilet, the pilot wrote.
“During a global pandemic, a visibly ill passenger was able to get through, through security, through the terminal loop, past a gate agent and onto a plane with … other passengers and … crew members,” the pilot said. writing.
In August, a pilot reported that an air hostess just before departure said that a passenger was coughing, not wearing a mask and was just throwing up on himself.
‘I have decided that the person is not suitable for a [long] fled and had to be removed, ”the pilot said in the report.
In other incidents, pilots and flight attendants blame their colleagues and employers.
A pilot reported to the database in September that an air hostess felt ill but did not disclose her symptoms to the pilot or other crew members. She later tested positive for COVID-19, the pilot said.
‘Lack of communication and transparency of the [flight attendant] “Due to her pre-existing health condition, the safety of passengers and fellow flight crews was paramount,” the pilot wrote.
In April, two flight attendants reported that although a passenger on one of their recent flights tested positive for the coronavirus, their airline ordered them to show up for service a few days later.
“The company refused to give us alternative travel, even though it was a potential carrier,” one of the flight attendants wrote in their report in the NASA database. “We were not given the assurance of tests during the landing, or that we would be allowed to quarantine during the full recommended 14 days to allow symptoms to manifest or not.”
But that’s the case on United Airlines’ flight last month – with Hernandez collapsing in the light of other travelers, and with efforts to revive him, captured on video and posted online – which most vivid and accessible picture of the problem.
United Airlines said Hernandez admitted on our ready-to-fly checklist that he was not diagnosed with COVID-19 and did not have COVID-related symptoms. “The airline said it only realized after Hernandez’s death that he ‘wrongly acknowledged this requirement’.
Hernandez had previously had health conditions, including high blood pressure and upper respiratory problems, and felt ill until the day of the trip, the airline said in a statement.
Hernandez collapsed early in the flight. At least three passengers with medical training, including Tony Aldapa, an emergency medical technician from Los Angeles, performed CPR on him in the hallway.
According to United Airlines, passengers about Hernandez’s wife told Aldapa that Hernandez had COVID symptoms, including loss of taste and smell. At least one posted about it on Twitter, prompting hundreds of reactions of outrage and panic.
Despite the remarks by Hernandez’s wife, the plane was not disinfected immediately after Hernandez was removed, and the flight to Los Angeles continued, the airline said.
At the time, the crew believed Hernandez had a heart attack and offered passengers the option to take a later flight, United Airlines spokesman Charles Hobart said. All the passengers chose to stay in the plane, he said.
Hobart said the CDC contacted United Airlines and that the airline provided the necessary information to notify the passengers on the flight that they may have been exposed to the virus.