Human heart left onboard forces Southwest flight to change course

 Friday, December 14, 2018 

 A Seattle to Dallas South Airlines flight has to turn around after a human heart was found onboard.

The heart was put on the aircraft in Sacramento before starting off to Seattle where it was supposed to be unloaded and delivered and the airline described the heart as a ‘life-cargo shipment’.

On Sunday the flight 3606 to Dallas made a u-turn in the middle of the journey and went back to Seattle when it was discovered that the organ was left behind mistakenly.

There was an initial shock wave among passengers  when the pilot made the announcements but they were later happy to save a life.

A Southwest spokesman reflected that it was necessary to deliver the shipments to the destination in the Seattle urgently. The safety of our customers and the safe delivery  of the precious cargo being transported everyday is the most important.

However, the details of the heart’s delivery and purpose of use was not clear.

Katherine Pliska, spokeswoman for LifeCenter Northwest, which organises the transfer of transplant organs in the region, said that  they only uses private flights and there’s a time limit to get where it needs to go.

Southwest did not name the company who sent the heart, it just mentioned that it is specialized in providing ‘life critical’ cargo.

In Seattle the passengers were deplaned and were kept waiting for five hours due to the uncalled ‘mechanical issue’ with the aircraft.

The passengers were deplaned in Seattle and were delayed for five hours due to an unrelated “mechanical issue” with the aircraft.

« Back to Page

• UK border control strikes threaten Christmas travel chaos to and from Spain

• New York City, coastal Northeast can embrace first snow of season

• Pent-up winter travel demand to continue to fuel airline recovery

• Central US: Powerful storm could bring tornadoes, blizzard conditions

• Turkey’s weak lira affects the tourism industry