Air Conditioned Planes in High Humidity Can Cause This to Happen

by Gary Leff

Air Asia flight 5583 from Kolkata to Bagdogra — a 277 mile flight — was 4.5 hours for mechanical reasons. After 90 minutes passengers were asked to get off the aircraft. It was pouring down rain and people didn’t want to leave.

Air conditioning on board aircraft will mist in highly humid conditions. Passengers contend that the captain turned up the air conditioning in order to smoke them out since they didn’t want to leave. That seems unlikely to me, the first response to passengers who aren’t following crew member instructions isn’t to give them air conditioning — indeed, air conditioning that was probably already on. Open the doors and the plane becomes more humid.

Nonetheless this passenger video has gone viral because of just how darned misty the plane has become. Passengers became sick from the mist.

Flight no I5 582 of Air Asia to Bagdogra. First they pushed back, then returned to bay .. then anounced technical snag. Kept stationary for one hour on tarmac to instruct deplaning. When passengers objected, put blowers in full blast to hound passengers out. Simply suffocating kids …
No food or water in beteeen.

You can hear passengers shouting, they do get up from their seats and they’re waiting to exit the aircraft. They seem to disappear in the mist.

About Gary Leff

Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel - a topic he has covered since 2002. Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »

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Comments

  1. Wouldn’t turning the a/c off make people leave? I’ve been on enough Asian flights to know that making the cabin uncomfortably hot is the norm rather than the exception. Turn the air off while on the ground and passengers will be clamoring to disembark.

  2. Eh…no big thang. I had a similar misty experience on a Cebu Pacific flight from Dumaguete to Manila in April. The fogging looked weird but was harmless.

  3. Bah…I’ve experienced this vapor phenomenon flying Cebu Pacific last April. It looks weird but it’s not going to make me want to disembark.

  4. I flew Calcutta to Badogra (Darjeeling) long ago, which required me to beg one of the managers of the Calcutta station of Indian Airlines (who had a huge portrait of Karl Marx in his office) to let me get the last biz class ticket on that flight. Not a memorable journey and it seems that hasn’t changed.

  6. “Air Asia flight 5583 from Kolkata to Bagdogra — a 277 mile flight — was 4.5 hours for mechanical reasons.”

    Um…it was 4.5 hours what? Delayed? Flying? Melting?

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