Delta Flight Diverts To Ohio Due To Woman Going Into Labor!!

Intro

We often come across some wild stories of what takes place on planes, and birth is certainly up near the top. From a baby being born on Cebu Pacific to Jazeera Airways, it's not unheard of for circumstances like this to occur, but it's certainly a rarity in the United States, with all of the rules and regulations.

Well, yesterday morning, a woman came pretty close to giving birth on board a Delta Airlines flight...

The Details

On the morning of August 20th, Delta flight number 668 was scheduled to operate the roughly 6-hour flight from New York JFK to San Francisco. The 757-200 departed early, and was making good time, when about 50 minutes into the flight, a woman went into labor!

A Delta 757 diverted to Ohio after a woman went into labor

A passenger on the plane helped out the woman in labor as the 757 descended quickly down into Columbus, Ohio. While the baby might not have been born on the plane, it's quite the story to have of going into labor at 36,000 feet...

The plane spent an hour and 30 minutes on the ground before departing again out to San Francisco, arriving an hour and 30 minutes behind schedule.

Amazing, But...

First and foremost, another life coming into this world is one of the most precious things on the planet. I've always been curious what it would be like to be born on a plane, as I am sure it's a madhouse of everyone scrambling.

However, this situation does reflect a deeper message: airlines have a point of not allowing people to fly during the final stage of pregnancy. Many airlines around the world follow this rule, while Delta does not. Diverting to Columbus must have been quite expensive, albeit needed, but this never would have happened if Delta hadn't allowed this, or made sure a fit-to-fly certificate was given...

Ehh... Semantics...

Final Thoughts

A Delta flight from New York to San Francisco was forced to divert to Ohio recently due to a woman going into labor on board. While on the one hand, this is amazing to see aviation become a part of one's life so early, but it reinforces the rule banning those in the final stages of pregnancy from flying.