There are few things more stressful on a longhaul flight than managing a restless toddler—but getting stuck in an airplane lavatory with one for over half an hour? That’s a whole new level of inflight horror.

Delta Passenger and Toddler Trapped in Lavatory Mid-Flight

A Delta Air Lines passenger recently shared his unsettling experience aboard flight DL68 from Taipei (TPE) to Seattle (SEA), when a trip to the lavatory with his three-year-old turned into a 35-minute ordeal after the door jammed shut midflight.

According to the father’s account on Reddit, he and his daughter headed to the mid-cabin lavatory about eight hours into the journey. Everything seemed normal until it came time to leave. Despite unlocking the door, the accordion-style partition refused to budge. Repeated attempts to open it were unsuccessful.

After his (clever) daighter pointed out there was a flight attendnat call button in the lavatory, the man hit the call button and began knocking on the door. Flight attendants eventually responded, but with the hum of engines, background noise, and language barriers (the crew initally did not know whether the two spoke English or Mandarin), communication was difficult. Making matters worse, the crew didn’t initially realize both the father and child were inside—the assumption was that an unaccompanied minor had wandered into the lavatory alone and become stuck.

Unsurprisingly in that cloistered space, the daughter became agitated. The father reported that his daughter became increasingly panicked, breaking into tears. As I know as a parent of two, there’s a particular kind of helplessness that sets in when you’re unable to comfort your child—multiply that by 30,000 feet and a jammed lavatory door!

Eventually, the crew attempted to force the door open from the outside (with a butter knife from Delta One business class) while the father pushed from inside. It took some time, but their combined efforts finally worked, and the pair was freed.

Why not just bust the door open? Apparently, the pilots were instructed not to allow it. The passenger added (as if to defend himself for not just breaking the door down), “For context, I’m 215 pounds and relatively strong, this door was secure. Part of me also thought the FAs kinda just assumed I was going to be angry, traumatized and useless in this situation, so my partner had to tell them repeatedly, let him help you.”

The lavatory was then taped shut for the remainder of the journey:

Compensation Necessary?

While there were no injuries, the father expressed frustration at what he described as a slow and disorganized response by the crew. After the incident, Delta offered the family 4,000 SkyMiles as a goodwill gesture—an amount the passenger called underwhelming, given the circumstances.

In correspondence with Delta days after the flight, he pushed back and was offered 17,000 SKyMiles per passenger (not just for the two stuck in the lavatory but for the party of five), but ultimately,  he negotiated and accepted a $200 voucher per passenger (which certainly puts into context the relative value of SkyMiles…).

Lavatory lock malfunctions are rare but not unheard of…I’m surprised that Delta does not have a toolkit of some kind to disable these locks in case of a malfunction.

CONCLUSION

Being stuck in a small, windowless room at 35,000 feet can be harrowing for anyone—let alone a young child. Perhaps the takeaway for Delta here is that it should stock its flights with more than butter knives to open lavatory doors?

As for the father, I suspect he told his daughter, “Next time, we’re holding it!” I hope she’s not afraid to use an aircraft lavatory for the rest of her life…

Hat Tip: PYOK