Memorial Day is notorious for its delayed travel, but on Monday a flight to Los Angeles made an emergency landing for a particularly distinctive cause: a sick dog that requires medical care.
Delta flight 694 was decouped from Detroit to Los Angeles International Airport on Monday evening, allowing passengers and sick dogs to descend to Minneapolis, according to an airline statement.
The crew were warned that the dog in the cabin felt bad and that the vet volunteered to provide emergency medical care. Rather than continuing the five-hour flight, it was decided to land the Airbus A320 as soon as possible, with 181 passengers and six crew members on board and two hours late.
“Customer and people safety comes before everything else in the Delta,” an airline spokesman said in a statement. “That’s why we’ve repurposed the Delta Flight 694 to an MSP to ensure that the sick cabin pet has received proper care.”
Health workers met the dog and its owner as soon as the plane arrived at Minneapolis-Sen-Paul International Airport. Passenger passengers told KTLA News that the captain announced that the pets are expected to survive.
The plane then resumed its journey and safely moved to Los Angeles for the remaining four hours.
Delta flight delays are somewhat unusual. According to a report by aerial analysis firm Cirium, in January, airlines ranked the most among US airlines, with 83% of flights landing by the time of arrival.
The Delta Flight 694 was one of around 7,691 flights that saw delays from and inside the United States on an anniversary, according to flight tracking website FlightAware. Most of these delays were caused by a series of serious thunderstorms that were not pet-related, but instead cleaning the southeast and central areas.
Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport had the worst travel issues with Flight 697, accounting for 59% of all trips, but was delayed. Denver International Airport ranks second with a flight delay of 565, accounting for 53% of all trips.
The LAX was much better than that, with 153 delays accounting for 16% of all flights. More than 400,000 Southern Californians were expected to travel by air over Memorial Day weekend, according to the AAA.
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