Panic in the air! A flight headed to Miami from Stockholm was forced to turn around after severe turbulence threw passengers out of their seats.
After returning to Stockholm, many of those passengers were rebooked to arrive back in Miami Friday night.
Cell phone video shows the panic at 36,000 feet. SAS flight 957, Stockholm to Miami, was west of Greenland when it hit severe turbulence. Passengers, cups and backpacks were thrown throughout the cabin.
Sammy Solstad started recording when the turbulence woke him up. “The lady and gentleman next to me... he was strapped down with the seatbelt, but he still had it loose... and his wife that was sitting next to him, she didn't have a seatbelt at all so she flew all the way up into the ceiling, hitting the head first.”
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Solstad also says his first instinct was to help. “You can hear in the video how I was screaming for the staff to help her up and buckle her in, but nobody did anything," Solstad said. "So I unstrapped myself and I ran across the plane and helped her up and strapped her in so she was safe."
Still far from Miami, the crew decided to turned back, landing in Copenhagen.
An SAS spokeswoman tells NBC News the flight to Miami encountered severe turbulence over Greenland. There are no reports of significant injuries.
Local
The airline’s policy is that any plane that hits severe turbulence must be inspected upon landing. Since SAS doesn’t have the facilities in Miami to do the inspection, the decision was made to turn back to Stockholm.
That was a bad decision, in Solstad’s opinion. “They had to fly back to Copenhagen, Denmark, which was five hours back... but we only had about 30 minutes to a Canadian Airport or maybe one hour to an American (airport)."
