This free flight would end up being the passengers' worst nightmare.
For the 20 attendants working on the Japan
Airlines plane, it was so far routine..
The aircraft, headed for Paris, was now ready to serve breakfast.
The flight attendants reheated the ham
omelettes and began their meal service.
The passengers woke up, hungry after several hours of
flying, and excited to eat a freshly prepared breakfast.
Little did they know, these eggs would derail their entire vacation.
The omelettes had such a severe effect on people that the plane had
to make an emergency landing as its passengers fought for their lives.
1975 — Tokyo, Japan.
344 excited passengers boarded a Japan
Airlines plane destined for Paris.
Most of the travellers were salespeople
for Coca-Cola, and their family members.
The employees had won a vacation to Paris, and Coca-Cola
had arranged a flight on a Boeing 747 aircraft for the trip.
The route had 3 legs that began in Tokyo’s Haneda
airport, had a stopover in Anchorage, Alaska to fuel up,
then crossed the Arctic to land in Copenhagen, Denmark
before finally heading to the final destination, Paris.
Including stops, the trip would take roughly 20 hours.
The passengers would be attended by a crew of around 20 people.
The first leg of the trip, Tokyo to Anchorage, went smoothly.
The plane then flew over the Arctic ocean and
entered European airspace around breakfast time.
Earlier, sandwiches had been handed out as a meal,
and now flight attendants prepared a second meal for
the passengers and crew, ham omelettes, an hour and
a half before the plane was set to land in Denmark.
The pilot and first officer working on the second leg of the flight
had been staying in Alaska, so they were running on a different
internal clock than the plane’s schedule and weren’t craving breakfast.
Instead, they preferred to have steak for dinner.
But for the passengers, omelettes were heated up and distributed.
People ate as the aircraft got closer and
closer to Kastrup Airport in Copenhagen.
They were only 30 minutes away from landing,
when it was clear something was terribly wrong.
Almost 150 passengers were suddenly violently sick—nauseated,
vomiting, and suffering from diarrhea and cramps.
There probably were not enough bathrooms
to accommodate the sudden high demand.
One flight attendant was struck as well, but the two pilots were
thankfully fine, and were able to make a quick landing in Copenhagen.
Most of the travellers were so severely ill
that immediate hospitalization was necessary.
The Paris vacation they had felt so lucky to win was
turning out pretty grim, and they hadn’t even reached the
destination yet, but that was the least of their worries.
Sick passengers were taken for emergency medical
care as soon as possible, but there was a problem.
None of the doctors in Denmark spoke any Japanese, and very few
of the passengers could even speak English, let alone Danish.
Where could they find people who could translate?
Thankfully, Japanese restaurants in Copenhagen were
contacted, and Japanese-speaking employees were
summoned to the hospital to assist during the crisis.
30 of the plane’s travellers were in critical condition.
The cause of the severe food poisoning was suspected
to be the breakfast omelettes, since people got sick
quickly, soon after consuming them, but authorities needed
to take a closer look before saying anything for sure.
There was also an interesting pattern of who got
sick—people who sat in the very back of the plane were fine.
All the passengers who got food poisoning had sat in
the front section, including those in first class.
An investigation was launched, led by
the Alaska State Health Department.
Tests made on samples of vomit, stool, and leftover ham omelettes
picked up a bacteria called Staphylococcus aureus, known more
commonly as staph, and high levels of toxins produced by the bacteria.
The culprit was indeed the breakfast omelettes,
but where had the contamination come from?
There were strict guidelines involving food
preparation that should have made this impossible.
Investigators traced the history of the breakfast
meals and discovered some uncomfortable things.
The meals were stored in conditions that would have made
it very easy for bacteria to reproduce and produce toxins.
After being made, the breakfasts sat in the kitchen at
room temperature for six hours, and even though the meals
were placed in a fridge for over 14 hours after that,
the fridge temperature was not low enough to be safe.
It’s recommended that food be stored at 40 degrees
Fahrenheit, or 4.4 degrees Celsius to stop the growth
of bacteria, but the omelettes had been stored in a
refrigerator at 50 degrees Fahrenheit, or 10 degrees Celsius.
They were taken out and stored in the plane ovens, again without
refrigeration, for another 8 hours before being reheated and served.
All in all, this adds up to over 28 hours of storage
without proper cool temperatures to ensure food safety,
plenty of time for bacteria to grow and release toxins.
But while these storage conditions were less than
satisfactory, they would not have caused illness on their own.
The investigation team decided to look closer at
International Inflight Catering, a branch of Japan Airlines
based in Anchorage, and where the meals had come from.
They learned that three cooks in the Anchorage kitchen were involved
in preparing the meals, and one of them had prepared all the first
class meals and the ones that went to the front galley, or kitchen.
The airplane had four galleys to serve the different areas of the
plane, and only meals that came from the front ones made people sick.
One cook had handled Danish canned ham that went into the
omelettes, and had helped prep 220 of the plane’s total 354 meals.
86% of those who ate his omelettes
suffered from food poisoning as a result.
The cook was wearing bandages on two of his fingers, and
it turned out that under the bandages, he had lesions.
He was aware of his blisters, which is why he covered them up, but
didn’t think they were important enough to report to his employer.
Furthermore, investigators found out that his managers did not confirm
that he was in good health, even though they were required to do so.
Tests revealed that the lesions were infected
with the staphylococci that had made everyone ill.
It takes only 100 staphylococci to cause food poisoning, so it made
sense that people had gotten so sick so quickly, now that we know
how long the meals were sitting out and accumulating toxins for.
The toxins are also heat-resistant, so the heating process
of the breakfasts did not destroy the contamination.
But it wasn’t just the cook’s infection that was to blame.
If the omelettes had been stored according to
proper food and safety guidelines, the entire
food poisoning outbreak would have been prevented.
It was the fact that the cook had a staph infection,
combined with the managers not verifying his health, and the
improper food storage all combined that led to this outbreak.
If just one of those factors were taken out, or the cook
had worn gloves, the whole incident could have been avoided.
It was very fortunate that the plane’s pilots opted for dinner over
breakfast, a chance preference that helped them narrowly avoid illness.
If they had eaten the omelettes and gotten as
sick as some of the passengers, they may not
have been able to even land the aircraft safely.
Ever since this incident, many airlines implemented a new
catering policy for cockpit crew members to eat different
meals prepared by different staff to prevent a food
poisoning incident from taking everyone out of commission.
Though the sudden illness before even arriving at the destination
definitely puts a bit of a damper on a romantic couple's getaway
or family vacation, at least no one was too severely affected.
Or so everyone thought.
Though the contaminated omelettes hadn’t directly resulted
in any loss of life of any passengers that got food
poisoning, there is unfortunately one fatality in this story.
Kenji Kuwabara, 52 years old, was the manager of catering for Japan
Airlines and vice president of International Inflight Catering.
The investigators of the Japan Airlines food poisoning
incident were very direct and honest in their
approach to determine how the outbreak happened.
They strongly emphasized that nobody with infected lesions
should handle food, and this meant that the catering company
had flaws in their system, since management did not inspect
or question the cooks about their health, and the cook was
not aware of the potential risks of him handling the food.
But even that mistake would have slipped by if the meals had
been stored continuously at the recommended low temperatures.
Again, this pointed the lesioned finger at the caterer’s standards.
The bad publicity and blow to the company reputation,
his personal responsibility as the head of the Anchorage
office, and losing face was too much for Kenji to bear.
Just days after the incident, in his
apartment in Anchorage, he took his own life.
He had worked with the airline for 25 years, and many colleagues who
were close to him mourned, along with his wife and four children.
Despite this incident serving as a lesson for all airlines, an NBC
News investigation indicated that the airline catering industry in
America has little oversight, and outbreaks are not easy to track.
The American FDA oversees food safety for airlines,
but inspects the industry a lot less than restaurants.
While restaurants are recommended for inspection every six
months, airline caterers can expect one every 3 to 5 years—and
for actual airlines, inspections occur randomly “when time
and opportunity allow.” Even when they do happen, many
violations can be found, but there are rarely consequences.
While some states may independently choose to impose
more regulations and inspections, there is no standard.
From 2015 to 2019, the FDA found condensation dripping onto food, fans
blowing dust onto meals, thermometers off by as many as 25 degrees, raw
meat contaminating cooked meat, moldy bread, listeria contaminations,
expired food usage, live insects and birds, and bird and rodent feces.
From October 2008 until late 2019, the FDA issued
almost 1500 food safety citations to 16 airlines
and the three major American airline caterers.
Some of these included serious issues, like not keeping food at
the correct temperature, and we all saw what that led to earlier.
Despite the violations, no caterers have been shut down.
According to food safety expert Jean Dible, there are six foods to
avoid if you are particularly worried about food safety on airplanes.
Dairy products are most prone to spoiling
when not stored in cold temperatures.
Ice is a surprising one, but bacteria can survive on
cubes and not all attendants may be diligent about washing
their hands or wearing gloves while handling ice cubes.
Deli meats are another thing to watch out for,
because they are consumed cold and don’t go through
a reheating process that can help kill bacteria.
Raw fruits and vegetables have the same risks.
With a melon, for example, bacteria can double every
20 minutes if the fruit is not properly stored.
Other high-risk produce includes leafy greens like lettuce and sprouts.
Uncooked rice often contains bacteria that can survive cooking
temperatures, and if the rice is cooled or sits in the wrong
temperature, the spores can grow and make someone very sick.
Rice needs to be reheated at 165 degrees
Fahrenheit in order to be totally safe to eat.
Finally, shrimp, a first-class staple,
can host many undesirable pathogens.
A 2015 study by Consumer Reports found that 60% of frozen shrimp
tested were positive for Salmonella, Vibrio vulnificus, Listeria or E. coli.
2% contained a super-bug called Staphylococcus aureus.
All seafood is risky, but shrimp and oysters are the most dangerous.
Safer options include soup, stews, and curries that are usually
reheated many times at high temperatures that kill bacteria.
Bread rolls, crackers, packed baked goods, and those
classic airplane pretzels are also pretty safe.
So, there’s no need to cancel your upcoming
trip or starve yourself on a flight.
Just be aware of the risks and the
reputation of your airline catering company.
As if there wasn’t already enough to
worry about while planning a vacation!
Now, planes are definitely out of the question.
That means the safest place I can travel to…
factoring in all the risks, is…
The living room!
That’ll be fun.
Based on our previous video about a man who secretly lived inside the
walls of a shopping mall for 4 years, we asked Twitter, "If you were
forced to live in one of these places, which one would you choose?"
Here are the results!