Amid airlines' stringent rules around preventing terrorist attacks and ensuring passenger safety, there have also been incidents in which common household items were mistaken to be weapons.
Boston's Logan International Airport was once evacuated after Transportation Security Administration (TSA) agents mistook a Sony (SNEJF) -) Playstation for a bomb while a woman in Arizona recently lost an $83 bottle of perfume when officers confiscated it over suspicion that it was shaped like a grenade.
Related: These are some of the most dangerous items TSA confiscated at airports
While most such incidents occur during the initial security screening, a recent flight was already in the air when it was forced to make an emergency turnaround over what was later discovered to be an adult diaper. Bound for Florida's Tampa from Panama City's Tocumen International Airport, the crew of the Copa Airlines flight received communication from airport security that a suspicious item might be in one of the plane's lavatories.
'We found it to be an adult diaper...'
The Boeing 737-800 (BA) -) landed back at Tocumen Airport around 11 a.m. local time and waited on the tarmac as 144 people were evacuated and anti-explosives team investigated the plane.
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"We had [the plane] on a secure runway where police special explosives canine units and special forces examined the object, and found it to be an adult diaper, ruling out any risk," José Castro, who heads security at Tocumen Airport, wrote on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter.
Panama's Policía Nacional also posted photos of the item on X — a large cloth diaper wrapped in several black garbage bags.
As initially reported by the Associated Press, the flight was then able to proceed to Tampa as planned and arrived by 7 p.m. local time with several hours' delay. Also known by the full name Compañía Panameña de Aviación, Copa Airlines is based in Panama City and is the primary carrier serving the Central American country.
This wasn't the first time a bathroom issue caused a plane to turn around
At the start of September 2023, a Delta Air Lines (DAL) -) flight from Atlanta to Italy's Rome needed to turn back around to the east coast of the U.S. two-and-half hours into the journey over a "biohazard issue" that was later revealed to be a bad case of passenger diarrhea.
"We've had a passenger who's had diarrhea all the way through the airplane, so they want us to come back to Atlanta," the pilot of the Airbus 350 (EADSF) -) is heard saying in the overheard announcement later shared by one of the passengers on the flight.
The unusual nature of the incident was quickly picked up both on social media and by mainstream news outlets — many internet commenters visualized what it must be like to have the feces "running under the seats soaking everyone's carry-on bags."
Another incident well-etched in aviation history took place in 1975 when 197 people aboard a Japan Air Lines flight from Alaska to Copenhagen got food poisoning after eating the in-flight meal of ham omelettes. The incident pushed aviation bodies to tighten rules for food that can be served onboard as well as inspired the plot of the 1980 film "Airplane."
