American Airlines Horror as Six Cabin Crew Struck Down by Mystery Mid-Flight Illness

An American Airlines transatlantic flight was forced to make an unexpected landing in Dublin after a crisis unfolded thousands of feet in the air.

Roughly three hours into the journey from Rome, several crew members reported experiencing sudden, unexplained symptoms onboard. Medical personnel were immediately called to meet the aircraft on the tarmac as investigators scrambled to determine what had gone wrong.

Mystery Smell Forces Flight Diversion

A strange smell reported onboard an American Airlines flight from Rome to Philadelphia forced the aircraft to divert to Dublin on Saturday, where multiple people were assessed by medical staff.

Flight tracking data from FlightAware shows that Flight 719, a Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner, departed Leonardo da Vinci International Airport (FCO) around midday local time before diverting to Dublin Airport nearly three hours later. Speaking to FOX Business, an American Airlines spokesperson said the issue was linked to an onboard oven.

Aviation insider JonNYC reported that multiple cabin crew members may have fallen ill during the incident. One passenger also described experiencing 'decompression and lower oxygen levels' near the front of the aircraft, according to JonNYC. The airline said there were 281 passengers and 12 crew members onboard the Boeing 787.

Crew and Passenger Checked by Paramedics

American Airlines said paramedics met the aircraft at the gate following its landing in Dublin as a precaution. Several flight attendants and one passenger were reportedly assessed by medical staff before being allowed to leave.

The airline confirmed that affected customers were provided with complimentary hotel accommodation before continuing to Philadelphia International Airport on replacement flights the following day.

The carrier added: 'We appreciate the understanding of our customers and thank our team members for their professionalism.'

Emergency Comes After Technology Disruption

The inflight emergency came during a challenging week for American Airlines, which had also been forced to halt operations across the US because of a separate technology failure.

Flights resumed on Tuesday 28 July, after a technology glitch prompted the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to impose a brief ground stop, causing delays to hundreds of flights.

Confirming that operations had resumed in a statement on X, the airline said: 'Systems are coming back online now and flights are departing again. We put a temporary ground stop in place while our teams worked to resolve the issue. We apologise to our customers for the inconvenience.'

More Than 1,300 Flights Affected

The system fault was first reported on social media after approximately 1,500 customers experienced problems accessing the American Airlines app and website. Following the issue, the FAA enforced a ground stop from 6:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. EDT, affecting all American Airlines aircraft yet to depart from airports across the US. Flights already in the air were allowed to continue without interruption.

Figures from FlightAware revealed that the carrier delayed 1,100 flights, representing roughly 30 per cent of Tuesday's scheduled operations, and cancelled a further 221, accounting for around 6 per cent of its schedule.

Compounding the disruption, severe thunderstorms caused separate delays and ground stops at several airports along the US East Coast. The airline has kept details of the outage limited, describing it only as a glitch that had 'briefly impacted connectivity for some of our systems'.