United Airlines Passenger Opens Exit Door, Hops Out While Plane Taxis

Image courtesy of arsheffield

It’s always important to know where the exits are on an aircraft, but it’s also important that you not use the exit until the plane has come to a stop — and even then, you should not take it upon yourself to open the door. These are lessons that one United Airlines passenger apparently forgot.

According to Police in Houston, the United flight had just landed from New Orleans at Bush Intercontinental Airport on Monday when a female passenger opened a hatch on the plane to exit and jumped out into an airport operating area, KHOU-11 reports.

“I look over and sunlight and I just see a figure essentially step out of it,” one passenger recalled to the news station. “And then I’m like, ‘What was that?’”

He posted a video from across the aisle, showing the door open after unexpected exit:

Another witness said the woman opened an over-wing exit door, and said nothing before jumping out of the plane, then about 15 feet from the wing to the ground below.

Authorities chased her down and detained her. After she finished neuropsychological testing, authorities said she will be released and is not facing any charges.

There might be something about Houston that makes people overly excited to arrive: In April, a United Airlines flight attendant deployed a plane’s slide after it had landed at the same airport, rode it down, and walked away from her job.

And it’s been awhile now, but you may recall another famous plane exit, that of JetBlue flight attendant Steven Slater. He became infamous in 2010 after he cursed out a passenger and then used the plane’s emergency slide to exit the plane and run away.

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