Frightening footage has emerged of a Norwegian Airlines flight to Miami which had to turn around on Thursday (November 14) and return to Europe after encountering severe turbulence over Greenland. The video clip that went viral on social media shows passengers screaming as the plane shakes violently, ejecting flyers from their seats. Food and handbags were also seen in the aisles before the pilots answered the call to return to a base in Copenhagen with 254 passengers and crew on board.

“Look at his feet touching the (ceiling)!” »wrote a passenger alongside a clip that went viral on social media. “I thought we were going to die.”

The plane had taken off from Stockholm around 12:55 p.m. local time and was due to land in Miami at 5:45 p.m. when the incident occurred. Despite the heavy shakedown operations, there were no serious injuries to passengers and crew, according to a Scandinavia Airlines spokesperson.

“After such turbulence, standard safety procedures require a thorough inspection of the aircraft,” the spokesperson said.

The passengers were put up in a hotel for the night and were booked on other flights Friday morning, according to a report from New York Post.

#BreakingNow A video of #SK957 cabin as extreme turbulence hit an SAS A330 over Greenland, throwing unbelted passengers into the ceiling. This incident shows how turbulence can occur without warning, making seat belts essential to passenger safety. pic.twitter.com/S4kCaKwnn0

– Antony Ochieng,KE (@Turbinetraveler) November 15, 2024

The flight, which typically lasts nine hours, was redirected to Copenhagen, Denmark, where technicians are checking for possible damage. According to reports, if the plane had continued its journey to Miami, it would have been grounded “for an extended period of time”, as the US city does not have the space or staff to inspect a plane with such damage . Aviation safety protocols require a thorough inspection of any aircraft when it experiences severe turbulence.

Read also | 11 injured after severe turbulence aboard Lufthansa flight to Frankfurt

Previous instance

This is not the first time that a Scandinavian airline flight has been forced to abandon its flight path and return to its original base. In September, a flight to Malaga, Spain, from Norway stopped when a mouse jumped out of a passenger’s meal and began wandering around the cabin.

The pilot was forced to land in Copenhagen due to a policy banning rodent flights, as they can chew through electrical cables.