Saudi plane flies 4 hours with dead man on board

A Saudi passenger aircraft en route from Jakarta to Riyadh made no emergency landing and continued its flight for nearly four hours despite the death of a passenger on board, a newspaper in the Gulf Kingdom reported on Tuesday.

The Saudia plane was crossing Sri Lanka’s air space when the 59-year-old man had a heart attack and was declared dead by a medicine student who happened to be aboard flight 817 on Monday, Sabq Arabic language daily said.

The unnamed passenger had fallen ill before take off but was allowed on board after receiving first aid at Jakarta airport.

“As the plane was in Sri Lanka’s airspace, the passenger had a heart attack….a medicine student who was on board tried in vain to revive his heart before declaring him dead…the plane did not attempt to make emergency landing and continued its flight for four hours until it reached Riyadh,” the paper said.

“Some passengers and aviation experts expressed their surprise that the aircraft did not make emergency landing to verify the death of the passenger as the pilot relied only on the judgment of a medicine student.”

Follow Emirates 24|7 on Google News.