Two people were found dead inside the landing gear compartment of a JetBlue airplane in South Florida after a flight arrived from New York City late Monday, according to the airline.
Authorities could be seen combing the scene early Tuesday morning. They offered details in the afternoon, but some of the bigger questions remained unanswered.
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WATCH HEREHere’s what we know according to the Broward Sheriff’s Office (BSO), Broward County Aviation Department and JetBlue.
Where were the bodies found?
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The men were found in the landing gear compartment of JetBlue flight 1801 on Monday night at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport during the "routine post-flight maintenance inspection," the company said.
BSO deputies responded at around 11:30 p.m. and pronounced both dead at the scene.
Local
Who are the deceased?
BSO spokesperson Carey Codd would only say that the two people found dead were men. Their identities and nationalities are not known.
How did they die?
The Broward County Medical Examiner’s Office will perform autopsies to determine the causes of death, authorities said.
For now, BSO is calling it a death investigation.
Where did the plane come from?
The aircraft had most recently operated flight 1801 from New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport, according to JetBlue.
The aircraft originated in Kingston, Jamaica, before stopping at JFK, Salt Lake City International Airport, JFK again and then Fort Lauderdale, a senior government official told NBC News.
It is not clear when they may have gotten onto the plane.
How did the men end up in the landing gear compartment?
Authorities would not say if the deceased were stowaways, or if they came to be in the compartment through some other means.
"At this time, the identities of the individuals and the circumstances surrounding how they accessed the aircraft remain under investigation," JetBlue said.
Were there impacts to airport operations?
No, according to Arlene Satchell, the public information office for the Broward County Aviation Department at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport.
"The passengers who arrived on the flight had already deplaned when the discovery was made, so again, there were no impacts to operations last night," she said.
Where is the airplane now?
“My understanding is that the aircraft is still here within JetBlue’s custody, but again, it’s in a remote parking area that is not impacting airport operations,” Satchell said.
Has this happened before at South Florida airports?
Satchell said in the past six years, it has not happened at FLL.
But at Miami International Airport, NBC6 has covered stowaway situations as recently as November of 2021, when a man survived the two-and-a-half hour flight to Miami from Guatemala City.
What does JetBlue have to say about the situation?
The company issued a statement Tuesday that read: "On Monday evening, January 6, at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport, two individuals were found in the landing gear compartment of one of our aircraft during the routine post-flight maintenance inspection. Tragically, both individuals were deceased. At this time, the identities of the individuals and the circumstances surrounding how they accessed the aircraft remain under investigation. This is a heartbreaking situation, and we are committed to working closely with authorities to support their efforts to understand how this occurred."
How often do people without tickets get onto commercial aircrafts?
According to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), they have never formally tracked stowaway cases.
However, the FAA told NBC6 in 2021 that a total of 129 people had attempted stowing away in aircraft between 1947 and February of that year. Of those, 100 people, approximately 78 percent, died.
A much earlier FAA report from 2011 said the "80 percent fatal/20 percent survive rate is a quite stable statistic."
Why is it dangerous to travel outside the aircraft cabin?
In 2021, former American Airlines pilot Wayne Ziskal, who said he once had a stowaway on one of his flights, said that below-freezing temperatures were just one of the many reasons stowing away is dangerous.
“People lose consciousness because of lack of oxygen or hypothermia or any of those things, and when the gear comes back down, they fall out, they’re not wedged in properly, or don’t hold on to something properly, and they fall out of the airplane to their death usually. It’s a very tragic thing,” he said.
According to the 2011 report from the FAA, "Stowaways face dangerous situations and risk death. Usually, a stowaway jumps into an aircraft by hanging on to the airliner’s landing gear as the plane takes off, and the force of the wind can easily make a stowaway fall to his death. Because people flying on aircraft as stowaways must stay within the landing gear area, they face other risks too, such as being crushed in a confined space when the gears retract, falling when the plane is landing, or dying from the heat produced by the engines of the aircraft. Death from hypothermia, caused by the extreme cold at high altitudes, or hypoxia (inadequate oxygen supply to the tissues), has also been documented."
