Scorpion On Plane: Alaska Airlines Believes Scorpion Picked Up In Mexico, Woman Stung On Board

A scorpion on a plane stung a passenger on an Alaska Airlines flight heading from Los Angeles to Oregon. Airline officials believe that the scorpion got on the plane when it departed from Mexico before landing at LAX. According to ABC News, the female passenger was stung before takeoff, and the plane was taken back to the gate.

“When the flight was at the gate, as medics were checking out the customer, some maintenance employees came on the plane to do a look through the cabin to make sure there were no other scorpions,” explained airline spokesman Cole Cosgrove.

The scorpion on the plane caused a 50-minute delay. The woman who got stung did not make her way to Oregon as planned. According to Yahoo! News, she refused to seek additional medical treatment, but there were not any updates made after the woman left the airport. Further details about the incident have not been made available.

As for the scorpion, it was trapped and killed by the flight attendants, but Cosgrove didn’t know how they managed it. Passengers on board said that the flight staff handled the situation really well. Everyone remained calm — even the woman who got stung. People cooperated, and the flight took off about an hour later, landing safely in Oregon without any other creepy crawly creatures lurking about the aisles.

Interestingly enough, this isn’t the first time that this has happened. Back in 2011, a passenger was stung by a scorpion on an Alaska Airlines flight. Passenger Jeff Ellis, 55, was on his way from Seattle to Anchorage when he felt something on his arm.

“I felt it on my shirt-sleeve and brushed it off, I thought it was a little spider or something. Then I felt it back on my elbow,” Ellis told the Associated Press at the time. “In the movies, scorpions kill people. I was just nervous, on edge, making sure that my heart was beating normal, that I wasn’t sweating.”

Ellis was checked out by medical personnel and was told to watch for signs of an allergic reaction. Officials believe that scorpion got on the plane during a stop in Austin, Texas.

As previously reported by the Inquisitr, the scorpion first made an appearance on a man on the plane, but he flicked it away. It then found its way to the female passenger and stung her. One passenger said that the woman was in good spirits and that she acted as if she had just been bitten by a mosquito.

[Photo by Uriel Sinai / Stringer / Getty Images]