An American Airlines Boeing 787-9 flying Rome to Philadelphia diverted to Dublin on Saturday after most of its cabin crew became dizzy and ill. About six of the nine flight attendants were affected.
Flight AA719, operated by 2019 delivery Boeing 787-9 (registration N840AN) left Rome Fiumicino shortly before 1 p.m.. Four hours into the trip, while cruising at 39,000 feet, the aircraft turned toward Ireland. It landed on runway 28L about six hours after leaving Rome and medical responders met the plane.
According to aviation watchdog JonNYC,
AA 719. Flight divert after 6 of 9 FA’s felt dizzy / ill.
He subsequently described it as “approx 6 FA’s affected.” So the uncertainty here is whether six is the confirmed number of sick crew.
on this, I'm told– 100% UNCONFIRMED–
"AA 719. Flight divert after 6 of 9 FA’s felt dizzy / ill."
100% unconfirmed. https://t.co/2uBxohJ0Bn
— JonNYC (@xJonNYC) July 25, 2026
approx 6 FA's affected.
— JonNYC (@xJonNYC) July 25, 2026
Some coverage has described this as six of eight flight attendants. American staffs its legacy Boeing 787-9s `with nine cabin crew, one above the FAA minimum. The aircraft remained in Dublin, and an additional flight, AA9601, appears in the schedule for Monday.
What Could Make Most Of The Flight Attendants Ill At Once?
JonNYC says he “wonder[s] if this was an oxygen-mask event for passengers too” so while the exact cause of flight attendants falling ill isn’t clear, I take the “too” here as intentional.
So it doesn’t seem to be a food issue or infectious disease. It could be pressurization, cabin air, or fumes. And it seems like it would have been localized to certain parts of the cabin since there’s no report of pilots becoming ill, smoke, or rapid descent.
Paddle Your Own Kanoo suggests,
The more likely cause for this diversion is a fault with the air conditioning packs that supply the air into the cabin. If even one of these packs stops working, the levels of oxygen in the cabin can drop to the point that passengers and crew could start feeling the early symptoms of hypoxia.
The 787 does not use engine bleed air to supply the cabin. Electrically powered cabin air compressors draw fresh outside air, which is used for ventilation and pressurization. That eliminates the conventional pathway where engine oil can contaminate air, but it doesn’t rule out fumes or contaminants originating elsewhere on the aircraft.
The FAA actually does contemplate operating a 787 with one of the two packs inoperative though requires remaining close to a suitable airport.
In 2019, American flight 729 from London Heathrow to Philadelphia also diverted to Dublin after a cleaning product spilled in a galley and seeped into carpeting. Two flight attendants temporarily lost consciousness, and three people were taken to the hospital.
Passengers May Be Owed $682 Each Or Nearly $200,000 Total
Because AA719 departed Rome, EU261 rules apply even though American is a U.S. airline.
American owes affected passengers meals, lodging where necessary and rerouting to Philadelphia regardless of why the diversion occurred. Passengers arriving at least four hours late may also be entitled to €600 in cash compensation unless American can establish extraordinary circumstances.
With 285 seats, on a full aircraft and at US$682 per passenger, American’s exposure here is $194,370. However, most passengers likely would not know to claim compensation, and those who do might have to fight a first-level objection. I’ve often seen unjustified denials of claims initially as a matter of course, with customers having to escalate before getting sufficient attention to acknowledge anything is legally due.
The European Court of Justice has held that unexpected illness of a required crewmember is part of normal airline operations and is not automatically an extraordinary circumstance. It seems like American would have to demonstrate an external contamination event (that didn’t result from their own management of the aircraft) in order to avoid liability.
Update: An American Airlines spokesperson shares,
On July 25, American Airlines flight 719, from Rome (FCO) to Philadelphia (PHL), diverted to Dublin (DUB) due to a reported odor onboard. We appreciate the understanding of our customers and thank our team members for their professionalism.
Glad everyone is ok, and hope for a speedy recovery to all.
Not to be the ‘Yeah! Tip-Assist!!’-guy from South Park about this, but… Yeah! EU261!!
(If this had happened in the US, and either because of mechanical or staffing issues, US passengers would have been told to ‘kick rocks’ and ‘pound sand.’ Oh, and here’s a $20 meal voucher that expires, soon, so go get a bottled water and some M&M’s quick!)
Someday, it’d be nice if our elected representatives stopped blindly accepting legal bribes from the airline lobby (A4A), and actually legislated true air passenger rights, like EU261, including a better baseline duty of care and compensation for affected passengers, and, at least bring back a Rule 240-equivalent. We deserve better.
Thank you, Gary, for posting about these stories.
“I didn’t have the fish. I had the lasagna.”
@1990 — why do you believe customers DESERVE compensation for this unfortunate incident? Europe had basically a “no fault” compensation system. In America, we generally require negligence. I don’t think “no fault” is better. Personally, I find myself rooting for my transatlantic delays to get over the 3 hours so I can collect a windfall I don’t deserve. That’s a stupid system, and raises the cost of travel for everyone.
Too much red wine in FCO.
@Chopsticks – Amen, and very well said. Morons in favor of such a stupid idea expose themselves for what they truly are.
@1990 – You said, “If this had happened in the US, either because of mechanical or staffing issues, US passengers would have been told to ‘kick rocks’ and ‘pound sand.’ Oh, and here’s a $20 meal voucher that expires soon, so go get a bottled water and some M&M’s quick!” On my last American Airlines flight from PHL to DTW—with over a four-hour delay and then a flight cancellation because the crew timed out and turned into pumpkins at midnight—passengers were graced with a $12 food voucher, not $20, and only if you asked and knew the secret handshake. On passengers’ next flight over 1,100 miles, American Airlines advised the overnight food voucher (awarded for enduring mechanical failure and crew bedtime) was just shy of covering a $13 fruit and cheese tray or the $14 turkey and Havarti sandwich. Apparently, semi-useless meal vouchers are American Airlines’ new way of saying “kick rocks” and “pound sand”—but with a smile! But don’t worry: you could buy two mini-cans of Doritos Cool Ranch Mini chips at $6 a can—if you enjoy paying haute cuisine prices for nine chips. Of course, they were sold out. I slept overnight on the airport floor at PHL because American Airlines didn’t want to issue hotel vouchers to their passengers. The second night, I paid for a hotel as American Airlines didn’t have sufficient seats and didn’t try to endorse their tickets to other airlines.
First thought is wondering whether this was truly unpredictable… or AA underinvestment in maintenance striking again. We’ll probably never know.
As I have experience rapid food poisoning in about 4 to 6 hours after consuming tainted food that left me dizzy as if I was quite drunk and unable to stand because the room felt as if it was spinning, it’s very likely that those 6 cabin crew members ate together before the flight and 3 didn’t. It just happens from time to time and the fact that no PAX or the flight deck crew is mentioned makes it all the more likely.
“Morons in favor of such a stupid idea expose themselves for what they truly are.”
As stated so well by H.L. Mencken.
“The kind of man who demands that government enforce his ideas is always the kind whose ideas are idiotic.”
@Chopsticks, @Mike Hunt, @Mike P — Dear sovereign citizens, you do not have to accept compensation from airlines that fail to deliver. You can opt out of that. Likewise, airlines can avoid such liabilities by actually delivering.
EU261 isn’t about handouts; it is an incentive for multi-billion-dollar corporations to internalize the costs of their own failures instead of treating passenger time as completely disposable.
@Ken A — You poor soul. This is how a “negligence-only” model just means travelers absorb hundreds in out-of-pocket costs while airlines face zero financial penalty for operational failures.
AA operates a 788 on DUB-PHL, but the flight left before the FCO-PHL diverted, I assume AA accommodated as many as the could on the Sunday DUB-PHL. The Monday recovery flight (AA 9601) was listed with a 10:30 departure that has now been delayed to 16:30. Certainly, it is frustrating and inconvenient for most. But, for those with flexible schedules, a free two days in Dublin isn’t so bad. And, the weather has been pretty good, everybody is in shorts. It’s in the upper 60s, but for the Irish, that’s a bit sweltering.
@All those don’t give a rip about the passengers on board, I have suggestion.
The next time you are on flight from EU country that has a problem that requires an airline to pay compensation under EU261, just tell the EU that you can’t take the compensation because this might be the one that causes AA to go bankrupt. And you do not want that on your conscience.
@AlanZ, yeah, but the problem is that EU261 costs airlines money. So, what do they do? Any economist would argue it increases the fare. So, if one is flying Europe to US, where EU 261 applies on all flights, haven’t we paid a higher fare for at least that segment than we would in an world without EU 261? EU 261 is effectively an insurance policy. Since my Europe-US airfare forced me to buy that insurance (through higher airfare), I will collect on it. There is no inconsistency from this in my mind.
@This comes to mind — Airfare isn’t that different, more or less, under EU261, UK261, or Canada APPR jurisdictions, relative to the US; it’s just that you’re protected there, and unprotected under our lack of regulations in the US.
(Actually, now that we’ve lost Spirit, ULCC’s like Ryanair, etc., may mean that airfares are technically less expensive overall in Europe than US… and they still have to adhere to EU/UK regulations for duty of care and compensation… and labor protections… and they’re still profitable… it’s a choice; Americans allow legal bribes, lobbying, which enables corporations to screw consumers with impunity…)
Funny how the airlines never want to take blame for their mistakes. If I tried that my 20+ year old business would be out of business.
Even more interesting is the bots/one or two commenters pretending to be more than that who try to defend corporate greed and ineptitude.
@Christian — It really is wild to witness some of the ‘shills’ on these sites. Like, if these are real people, who actually fly on planes, at some point, they most certainly have dealt with an avoidable excessive delay or cancellation caused by the airline (like a maintenance or staffing issue), only to be left out in the cold by those greedy corporations, and yet… they still decide to spend their free time, on a freaking weekend, no less, defending those companies that screw them (and will likely screw them again, soon enough, because we still do not regulate them in this way in the US)… just wild.
Please stop relying on travel bloggers like “Paddle Your Own Canoo” for information on technical matters. His comment on this situation is comically ignorant.
<<>>
“If even one of these packs stops working..” Well, there’s only two of them. If you lose one, the max operating altitude changes to FL350 but a non-ETOPS flight can continue to destination. There is an ETOPS restriction on single pack ops but that is due to the distance from alternate airports. Nothing to do with low oxygen levels or hypoxia. Complete nonsense.
I hope the cabin crew and passengers are all ok. I generally have no sympathy for an airline when there is a delay due to circumstances within their control. However this situation as described seems extraordinary. I’m not sure what I would do if I were a passenger on this aircraft. I do not think I would feel guilty accepting compensation legally due to me but I would also be thankful to not have gotten sick myself or worse.
First mistake was flying AA anywhere….. Hmm… Just a thought.
@jay johnson — Nice ‘umm ackchallee’ …here’s mine: Matt at PYOK spells it with a ‘K.’
The recover flight 9601, scheduled for 10:30 today, took off at 16:55, with an expected arrival in PHL of 18:52. I wonder how many are on that flight. AA had a regularly scheduled DUB-PHL B788 depart on Sunday and Monday. Plus, there were Sunday and Monday flights DUB to CLT, DFW, and ORD (772, 772, 788).flights for those connecting in PHL.
“In 2019, American flight 729 from London Heathrow to Philadelphia also diverted to Dublin after a cleaning product spilled in a galley and seeped into carpeting”
I know you’re an airline blogger not a professional journalist, but this bogus PR lie from AA spin doctors was throughly debunked way back in 2019. Cleaning product???? The aircraft in question was an A330 with extensive fume and APU oil leak history. The inbound aircraft was written up for fumes and maintenance personnel knew the history when they cleared the aircraft for return flight to PHL with a contaminated environmental system. https://www.bbc.com/news/business-50461302
Nothing personal, I just tire of the lazy reporting on this topic. There is no such thing as “a mysterious dirty sock smell” There is absolutely no mystery. It’s toxic fumes generated by synthetic aviation oil contaminating the environmental system. It’s also no joke. Fume events can be career ending and can greatly diminish quality of life and lifespan even for passengers. Serious brain and nervous system injury not uncommon. Can even trigger near-term ALS and dementia. Highly carcinogenic and major reproductive hazard in trace amounts. Fumes from aviation lubricating fluids have been a known issue since the 1950’s but it’s been extremely well reported recently with the LA Times doing a huge multi-part expose in 2020 and the Wall Street Journal doing an entire series this past year. WSJ’s reporting was surprisingly good.
@captain buck lucky- simply didn’t want to get into the weeds over that specific flight for the purposes of this post, certainly didn’t mean to trigger you, i was all over the seriousness of aircraft fume events before the 2020 stuff you’re talking about – for instance this from 2019 https://viewfromthewing.com/is-airbus-doing-enough-to-stop-the-fumes-that-are-making-people-sick/
Sorry if I was unfairly snippy and kudos to you for your Airbus fume post in 2019.
I chirped up in the comments because your link to “mystery fume that sickened crew was cleaning fluid” story was a perfect example of the effectiveness of laughably bad, already debunked airline propaganda. Airline PR departments know that local media usually pick up these types of stories first, and they know these organizations are typically gullible and not well staffed. They almost always feed them some ridiculous BS to get a fake story out quickly. It usually works, but it shouldn’t. After the propaganda story is out there, national news media reprint the bogus cleaning fluid or “mystery odor” sickens 30 passengers and 5 crew story. Hardly anyone in the general public catches the small print retraction 3 days later (if it ever comes) or the investigative debunking of the fake story the week after. The bad reporting is never scrubbed from the record and regular folks and bloggers like yourself continue to read and link to the debunked reporting seven years later. My beef isn’t with you or others like you, but rather the people at the airlines and the manufacturers who know they’re spreading lies and engaging in a gigantic coverup. I also have a problem with paid journalists who were trained to do proper journalism (fact checking, investigation, etc.) but instead spread industry lies and propaganda because they are too lazy to Google “aircraft toxic fumes.”