A Jet Blue Airliner attempting to fly from Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., to Newark, NJ, spent seven hours motionless on a runway at Bradley Airport in Hartford, Ct., where the plane had been diverted thanks to snowy weather conditions.
According to ABC News, more than 200 passengers were stranded on the plane without food, water or functioning restrooms. The plane, which left Ft. Lauderdale around 10 a.m., was unable to land at Newark Liberty International Airport and flew to Hartford, Ct. instead, where it landed at 1:30 p.m. There the plane idled until 9 p.m.
Passenger Andrew Carter, a sports reporter for the South Florida Sun Sentinel sent to cover Sunday's Miami Dolphins-New York Giants football game, recounted the incident to his newspaper via cell phone.
“There's been no real explanation as to why we've been sitting here for seven hours … We ran out of water. The bathrooms are all clogged up and disgusting. The power would go off every 45 minutes or so for five minutes or so, and that would freak people out. I've heard about these kind of stories."
Most passengers remained calm, Carter said, although some threatened to call the police. Firefighters were summoned to help a paraplegic man who had difficulty circulating his legs and needed to be removed from the plane.
