Breaking: Emirates jet at JFK quarantined as many on board have fevers and are coughing

[Mrs. Overall]

Link to tweet

Sam Sweeney (ABC)
?
BREAKING: An Emirates A380 in quarantine at JFK Airport right now awaiting CDC officials after about 100 passengers became ill with fevers over 100 degrees and coughing. Flight 203 had just arrived from Dubai.

UPDATE: Emirates Airlines is saying only 10 people are ill, but there are multiple individuals being taken away in ambulances, including all of the crew.

[maryellen99]

1. That is horrible

I hope the passengers recover.

[Cracklin Charlie]

2. Fevers?

Infection?

Seems a rapid onset of 100 cases with fever.

[mr_lebowski]

11. It does take a pretty long time to fly from UAE, it's like other side of world ...

With layover(s) I think 18 hours travel from there isn't uncommon ...

But yeah, that don't seem normal ... maybe, you know, 10 people sitting next to someone who was sick and sneezing but 100 is quite a spread in not that long of time.

[MiniMe]

16. Planes are incubators

And the air is constantly recycled. I got sick recently on a flight and it certainly wasn't a flight as long as from Dubai. I'm glad they caught it while the people are still on the plane.

[PatSeg]

25. Good point

I hadn't thought of airplanes as incubators, but that would explain why 100 people got ill in such a short period of time. Very disturbing.

I really feel for the passengers. Just imagine being very ill and stuck on a crowded plane, where you can't even lie down on a bed. Not to mention sharing a tiny bathroom with all those people. I'm getting claustrophobic and sweaty just thinking about it.

[MiniMe]

28. Agree with that

Hopefully it is one of those planes that have the things where you can lay down. I think Emerites (not sure how you spell it) is one of the planes that they advertise that

[PatSeg]

40. I was thinking of what I need

when I'm sick and don't think I'd find it on a crowded plane. Hopefully, they will be able to lie down and have access to lots of fluids. Can you imagine being a doctor or a nurse trying to treat all those people in a cramped airplane?

[Pacifist Patriot]

43. Media published an update that it's about 10 people not around 100.

Either way, I agree with you. That has got to be utter misery!

[PatSeg]

44. 10 instead of around 100?

That's quite a difference, but as you say still "utter misery".

[MiniMe]

59. Of course, keeping them in the incubator is going to make more people sick

[Fred Sanders]

62. The cabin air is no recycled.

Airliners obtain clean, compressed air from the engines and use this for air conditioning, ventilation, and pressurization. The air is removed from the front of the engine, right after it is sucked in from the outside, so it doesn't contain any exhaust gases or other toxic stuff. Even so, it is still heavily filtered before it goes into the cabin.

[Pacifist Patriot]

24. Co-workers just went to UAE last month.

I can't remember whether it was coming or going, but one direction or the other took them over 24 hours.

[GemDigger]

3. This does not sound normal.

[Zoonart]

4. Uh Oh...here we go.

Terror attack? Pathogen?

[certainot]

69. these are the kinds of things that make 1500 rw radio stations so dangerous

the ebola event in 2014? was turned into an election factor as limbaugh and spawn blamed immigrants and obama, saying he actually wanted it to consolidate power

and because the left ignores those stations they can turn anything like this into a an authoritarian dream - spread fear with unchallenged lying and exaggeration, blame immigrants and democrats, and call for military action and a police state

but maybe it's just sam & ella

[Zoonart]

71. Due to quick 14hr onset...

Sam and Ella fits. Fits with fever too.

[malaise]

5. How does anything spread that quickly?

Get thee to the greatest page

[Wounded Bear]

10. Dubai to JFK is what? 14 hours...

in an enclosed space with dozens of people confined.

Sure, it sounds suspicious, but I'll wait for the CDC report before I speculate.

[malaise]

20. I'll also wait

but 100 people picking up a virus in 14 hours must raise questions.

[kcr]

32. True. And there must have been a number of very noticeably sick people in the first place

for flight attendants to notice something was wrong.

[Pacifist Patriot]

34. The norovirus has an incubation period as low as 12 hours.

Bacterial infections can incubate in less than an hour!

[woodsprite]

75. I had that last year. Norovirus is hell! n/t

[Pacifist Patriot]

78. My husband brought it back from the UK in January 2008.

Ripped through our family (me, our three kids, and his parents) with a vengeance! While on vacation in Key West. Hell is right!

[Nay]

48. Yep -- very unusual, and the CDC thinks so, too. For a reason. Food poisoning USUALLY

doesn't come with fever and coughing, so it's probably not that. And just plain viruses and bacteria? Sure, they get passed around in a plane, but the rapid onset indicates a rather virulent strain of whatever it is just from the speed. Even if all those passengers and crew had been together for the whole 14 - 24 hours of the flights from the ME (which they weren't - crew aren't allowed to fly that long and passengers don't move in a bloc from one plane to another -- they have different destinations and boarding places).

Taking all that into account, I can see why the CDC went screaming over there. Virulence, speed of infection, speed of onset of symptoms -- it's all hair-raising. You don't want these people to be walking around JFK.

[malaise]

52. I wondered about that n/t

[Eliot Rosewater]

54. We still have a functioning CDC? I am serious, I was pretty sure every single area of our

government had been completely destroyed by now if for no other reason than morale.

Good to know it isnt entirely destroyed yet.

[femmedem]

91. No, the CDC is in as much trouble as everything else, and it's terrifying.

The Atlantic has run a few good articles on it recently.

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2018/02/cdc-funding-pandemics/552224/

and https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/07/when-the-next-plague-hits/561734/

[Eliot Rosewater]

92. Of course, figured. Well, when we are all foaming at the mouth we can at least say

"but it could be worse, a woman who once gave one speech could be in charge"

[Ilsa]

29. Not so much as how quickly it spreads versus

the incubation stage. Sounds like it spreads quickly via air circulating. If only one was sick 18 hours ago, then the incubation period seems pretty quick if the next nine (or 99) people are already in the prodomal stage. We don't even know if they have reached the most acute stage of whatever disease this is.

Glad they called the CDC.

[malaise]

30. Good point

and yes - a good call to the CDC

[Texin]

45. The influenze pandemic of 1918 had rapid onset and death, sometimes in the span of 6-10 hours.

There are anecdotes of people actually getting up in the morning with no symptoms whatsoever - not a fever, general malaise or cough - and they were actually dropping dead by noon, their bodies overwhelmed by the virus, which caused edema of the lungs and multiple organ failure.

The actual flu can have rapid onset of symptoms as well. I remember when I was in college and got up and went to class at around 8 a.m. feeling fine, and during my last class of the day around 11:00 that morning I had a pounding headache, fever, chills, body ache, and felt so tired and weak I wondered how I was going to get from class to the car to go home. I collapsed on the bed when I got home and couldn't hardly move enough to get to the bathroom for about 36 hours, and I was sick for nearly eight days thereafter, but with diminishing symptoms, just exhaustion from fighting the virus.

[jberryhill]

66. Easy

Hajj ended August 24. If the group of 10 were traveling together, then "quickly" is as many weeks as they have been together.

[unblock]

6. hope it's not meningitis

not a doctor, but what illnesses could spread so quickly and show fever so quickly?

i suspect meningitis is among them, not sure, and not sure what others illnesses are possible here.

[mr_lebowski]

7. Holy Crap ... it's starting ...

If these people start dying I'm going to freak the F*** right out ...

[Eliot Rosewater]

56. My first thought was Dustin Hoffman's

[Roland99]

76. Capt Tripp's

[X_Digger]

85. Considering your username, that's.. not EVEN funny.

[Roland99]

86. Hehe

We are well met

[populistdriven]

93. Trump using this emergency to build the wall high enough so planes can't cross it

[dameatball]

8. I hope it is not what it sounds like. Normal incubation time for flu, etc., would be longer I think

[maryellen99]

9. I hope it stays contained on the aircraft

With this administration,they have no clue how to control anything much less a pandemic.

[dameatball]

13. Indeed. This admin has not been helpful to the CDC anyway.

[malaise]

21. They can't even control the Con' mouth or tweets

[Mrs. Overall]

22. They are loading people into multiple ambulances. Seems odd if there is a quarantine.

[brooklynite]

12. Informed opinion from a friend...

Link to tweet

[Hortensis]

19. Thanks for sensible info. And 10 sick is hugely different

from 100 during one plane flight. Guess I won't dash down to the basement and try to find out where that box of N95 particulate masks is hiding after all. It's been missing since the last big flu epidemic that didn't happen.

[Texin]

47. Isn't MERS often described as being like the Spanish Flu?

[Mrs. Overall]

14. UPDATE:

Emirates Airlines is saying only 10 people are ill, but there are multiple individuals being taken away in ambulances, including all of the crew.

[Nay]

50. That's because the CDC knows what's what, and they don't give 2 shits about Emirates propaganda.

And thank the gods for that.

[Mad-in-Mo]

15. How will the Orange Wonder

solve this one? You know he will take credit for some part of this.

[Aristus]

17. Any chance they're just sick of living in the UAE?

[jberryhill]

63. Hajj ended last week

They've likely all been to the same place and the 10 were travelling as a group.

[Aristus]

64. That makes sense.

Thanks!

[hedda_foil]

18. Sounds like something worse than anything we're familiar with. A few people can get On a plane sick

And they can get sicker during a 20 hour plane trip. A hundred people don't. A few people can get sick in flight. Many passengers can catch something from a sick fellow passenger. But most illnesses have an incubation period of at least a couple of days. 100 passengers suddenly springing fevers during a flight sounds like they have caught something while they were all together as in while on that plane, which would seem to mean a highly contagious illness with a very short incubation time.

[Pacifist Patriot]

39. Norovirus could do it on a flight that long, as could a bacterial infection.

I'm just trying to think positive that it's nothing too frightening.

[marybourg]

51. They may have been a group all together in Mecca.

[jberryhill]

65. Hajj just ended

Most likely the sick folks are returning from Hajj as a group.

[democratisphere]

23. One more great reason not to fly or take a cruise ship.

Incubators.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

31. Perhaps you have not heard of Norovirus ("winter vomiting bug") and cruise ships. . . . nt

[Pacifist Patriot]

37. I went on a Disney cruise in 2012 that was devastated by norovirus.

No fun!

[Tipperary]

41. Flying is pretty much the only way to travel long distances, especially across oceans.

I am not wild about flying, but traveling is in my blood.

[jaysunb]

26. This is straight out of a Stephen King novel n/t

[atreides1]

27. Captain Trips????

[Pacifist Patriot]

35. Oh do not go there!

[mr_lebowski]

38. Kalavirus!

Hell, dang 12 Monkeys outbreak started at the airport in the movie ...

[ToxMarz]

33. When the UAE sends its people,

they're not sending their best!

[bunny planet]

36. update

https://mobile.twitter.com/Newsweek/status/1037346482742018049?s=09

[Pacifist Patriot]

42. That's a pretty important missing zero there.

[SDJay]

46. I'm Surprised

this doesn't happen more often. I travel around the world a lot and can't even remember how many obviously ill people with whom I've shared planes and gates. As said, you're climbing into a small metal tube with an enclosed atmosphere, so anything airborne is literally blowing all over you for an extended period of time on longer flights.

[bucolic_frolic]

49. Sounds like plague

or some other illness encountered in-flight.

Poor people ... but we still have a CDC!! How did that manage to escape Trump's Social Darwinism?

[Frustratedlady]

68. I thought he cut their budget drastically a few months back...around his tax break.

It was some health-related organization and I'm pretty sure it was the CDC.

[LanternWaste]

79. The CDC's global disease outbreak budget was cut by 80%

It was originally funded after the hysteria in the US in regards to the Ebola outbreak.

Countries where the CDC planned to scale back included some of the world’s hot spots for emerging infectious disease, (China, Pakistan, Haiti, Rwanda, Congo, etc).

[Frustratedlady]

80. Thank you. I may be old, but some memory cells are still working...kinda.

I remember thinking at the time that we better not have an outbreak of some serious disease while Trump was POTUS.

[irisblue]

53. anyone else think about Fringe the TV show, S1Ep1? nt

[Grasswire2]

55. Is Dubai considered a shithole country now?

Just askin'.....

[TwistOneUp]

57. Sounds like...

The managers improved their profit margins by *failing to clean the air filters*. Aircraft are "big pass-around family-sized buckets of bacteria". Nature only knows how many types of illnesses these passengers are experiencing. Fuel 'em up and send 'em back? No! Cheetolini has property in Abu Dhabi so now their sick plane is our problem.

Think how easy it is to do germ warfare - just infect some passengers going to the target and let them board their flight.

And my friends wonder why I'm staying at home more and more these days...

[fescuerescue]

58. New Trump Strategy?

Block immigrants based on vague health scares?

SOmeone needs to follow those abulances. They are probably going to detention centers.

[MontanaMama]

60. Big difference between 10 and 100.

The truth may be somewhere in between which is why the CDC is involved. Regardless, everyone on board has been exposed and incubation for them has begun. I really hope this turns out to be something minor.

[Renew Deal]

61. I doubt it's ebola

[orleans]

67. this from cnn an hour ago

"While the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and a source with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey said as many as 100 passengers reported feeling sick, the airline said only about 10 passengers had "taken ill."

https://www.cnn.com/2018/09/05/health/new-york-plane-jfk-passengers-ill/index.html

[marybourg]

70. So the other 90 are being

sent out into the community? Good thinking!

[Tipperary]

84. We do not know that,do we?

[marybourg]

90. It was implied in the linked article.

A later article confirmed that the actually were.

[Nanjeanne]

72. Holy Crap. I'm flying Emirates to Milan on Sept 17 and my husband as multiple myeloma

which means his immune system is compromised! We chose Emirates because their business class product in a 380is great and flight is direct.

This is scary.

[sandensea]

73. For all you horror flick fans out there:

Quarantine II

Good plot, well-cast, nothing over the top. Not for anyone with a heart condition though.

[Roland99]

74. Did they have the fish?

[MissB]

82. I picked a bad week to stop sniffling glue. n/t

[essme]

87. Johnny, what do you make of this???

This? Why I could make a brooch, a hat, a pterodactyl......

[Tucker08087]

77. I had Legionella once (Legionaires Disease)

It had sudden onset and all of those symptoms. It’s extremely contagious and comes from moist air ducts, like an air conditioning duct system. We are often exposed, but our natural immunities fight it. I’m not diagnosing, just saying it’s possible. Luckily, it is treatable with antibiotics if that’s what it is and it is caught quickly.

[fescuerescue]

81. Assuming it's not a Trump way to punish immigrants, I feel bad for these folks

They are going to have suffer under our horrible healthcare system.

Probably the worst place in the world for these folks to get sick.

[Mrs. Overall]

83. Vanilla Ice is on this plane and has been tweeting:

Link to tweet

Vanilla Ice
?Verified account
@vanillaice

So I just landed in New York coming back from Dubai and now I’m stuck on the runway with like 1000 police, ambulances, fire trucks, this is crazy.

[Recursion]

88. Is that three planes in one day? WTF? (nt)

[WhiteTara]

89. Wasn't that the Emir sitting next to trump?