‘Pee In A Bag,’ Passengers Told After Mid-Flight Toilet Backup

PHOENIX, AZ — That six-plus-hours flight from Phoenix to Kona, Hawaii, is a long one, making the trip to the airplane lavatory unavoidable for many passengers. It’s not a place most of us like to go, but it was an especially unpleasant experience for those on board a flight across the Pacific last week after someone flushed a diaper down the toilet, causing it to overflow. There was no way to fix the problem until the plane landed, so those on board were told to urinate in bags and bottles.

An in-flight announcement with about two hours remaining before landing stunned the 187 passengers on American Airlines Flight 663, and flight attendants told them they would have to improvise by using bags and bottles. The lavatory was working when the flight took off from Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport, the airline said in a statement.

A woman on board the flight told television station KPNX the flight attendant told her she should urinate in a plastic bag.

“What do you mean I have to pee in a bag?” she asked.

The woman, who told KPNX she was too embarrassed to go on camera, said other passengers had the same surreal conversation with the flight attendant.

“There was one lady who, unfortunately she had a toddler that needed to use the restroom, and same thing. She was told she had to use a bag,” the woman told the television station. “She opened the door to the toilet, and the grimace on her face … you could tell she was going to get sick to her stomach because of the sight and the smell.”

American Airlines said that once the plane landed, the toilet was fixed and it was operable on the return flight to Phoenix. Passengers were given 30,000 AAdvantage Miles, enough for a free round-trip flight, the airline said.

The woman who shot the video told KPNX she doesn’t think the compensation is adequate for what she and other passengers experienced.

The plane’s location when the toilet backed up required a deviation from protocol. Waste travels through pipes to the rear of the plane, where it remains in a tank that can only be accessed from the outside.

“At American, lavatories must be working properly prior to departure. If an American flight is in the air, and all lavatories become inoperative, the flight will divert to the nearest suitable airport in order for maintenance to rectify the situation,” American said. “Due to the location of the aircraft, the flight continued to its intended destination. The issue was subsequently rectified upon arrival in Kona, and our flight returned to Phoenix as scheduled.”

You can watch the woman's video here:

Photo via Shutterstock / media_digital