During a recent Delta flight, passengers found themselves in an alarming situation when a ceiling panel came loose mid-air, forcing them to hold it up themselves.
Tom Witschy, a 35-year-old from Chicago sitting in seat 19B, shared his experience with PEOPLE, describing the chaos aboard Delta Flight 2417, which had taken off from Atlanta en route to Chicago on April 14 before being forced to turn back.
During take-off, the passenger next to me and I heard a noise overhead, which we initially thought was just luggage shifting in the overhead bins,” Witschy recounted. “But soon after, there was a loud bang, and a section of the cabin ceiling detached and came crashing down, nearly hitting an elderly woman sitting in the aisle seat of Row 18B.”
According to Witschy, the loose panel was barely clinging on, attached only by its front right corner.
I grabbed the nearest corner of the panel to stop it from swinging into our row as the plane continued to climb,” Witschy said, noting that two other men seated nearby also jumped in to help, while the flight attendants remained seated due to the ongoing ascent.
The three of us held onto it for about 10 to 15 minutes until the flight crew was finally able to get up and assess the situation,” he continued. “We kept supporting the panel while they notified the pilots and searched for some tape to secure it. This effort stretched on for another 30 minutes or so.
At this point, a passenger—whom Witschy identified as an engineer—stood up and balanced on an armrest to inspect the ceiling panel.
My neighbour quickly figured out that a screw or bolt was missing, which was causing the corner of the panel above the woman in front of me to come loose. Without fixing it, the panel wouldn’t stay in place,” Witschy explained. “One of the flight attendants searched the plane for supplies until a man seated ahead of us offered some bright yellow Scotch tape he had on hand. That’s what she and a few other passengers used to secure the panel.
Witschy estimated that the passengers held the ceiling panel in place with their hands for about 30 to 45 minutes before the tape finally arrived to provide a temporary fix.
The flight attendants were really kind and kept offering us free drinks for helping hold it up, but we were all like, ‘It’s 10 a.m., we’re good,'” he recalled. He also mentioned that despite being closer to Chicago Midway, the flight ended up returning to Atlanta.
