If you’re traveling around major U.S. holidays, especially during the winter, you need to be prepared for flight delays and cancelations. It sucks, but that’s just the way it is. Sometimes, airlines mess up and lie to you about it, but other times, a massive storm rolls in and messes everything up. On Monday, though, NBC News reports that Delta passengers in Salt Lake City, Utah had to deal with a completely unexpected reason for their flight being canceled — a dead body found in one of the plane’s engines.
Details of what exactly happened are currently limited as investigators work to piece together the series of events that led to the man’s death. For now, we know he reportedly broke through an emergency exit to get onto the tarmac. Passengers were already on board the plane when authorities found him “inside the engine’s removable metal covering.” By then, he was already unconscious, and attempts to save his life failed. He died at the scene.
Delta canceled the flight and rebooked the affected passengers. “As nothing is more important than the safety and security of our customers and people, Delta is fully cooperating with all aviation authority and law enforcement investigations,” a Delta spokesperson told NBC News.
Typically, when someone ends up in an airplane engine, it’s pretty clear why they died. In this case, though, the engines were reportedly not yet running, so it probably wasn’t the engine itself that caused his death. “It is unclear at this time what injuries caused the man’s death whose name is being withheld upon notification of family members,” the Salt Lake City International Airport said in a statement.
Unfortunately for the man’s friends and family, no matter what officials uncover, the news of this man’s death is going to be devastating.
