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Passengers waiting to fly from Houston to Atlanta on Wednesday were delayed by several hours when a swarm of bees congregated on the aircraft’s wing shortly before takeoff.
“Bee-lieve it or not, Delta flight 1682 from Houston-Bush to Atlanta took a delay yesterday afternoon after a friendly group of bees evidently wanted to talk shop with the winglet of our airplanes, no doubt to share the latest about flying conditions at the airport,” a spokesperson for Delta, which was operating the flight, told Fortune in an email.
The Airbus A320 eventually took off around three hours later than its scheduled departure time, after Delta carried out a pushback of the airplane with no customers on board and shook the bees loose.
It said this had been done after previous safe actions did not prove successful in shaking off the swarm, and that the flight had needed to be delayed to protect the bees’ welfare and ensure that no surfaces of the aircraft were contaminated.
Delta said it had been told the kind of swarming seen on Wednesday is rare but not unheard of, and can occur on virtually any outdoor structure in environments where bees are found.
The flight, which had 92 passengers on board, landed in Atlanta four hours and 16 minutes late, according to data from the flight tracking website FlightAware.
One passenger tweeted images of the bees assembled on the plane’s wing as she waited to board the flight.
She said the captain eventually came out and told waiting passengers that a beekeeper was being deployed to investigate the situation, but later gave an update that the expert was not coming to help as they were not allowed to touch the aircraft.
Other failed tactics to get the bees to disperse included blowing vehicle exhaust fumes onto the swarm, according to the passenger who documented the delay on Twitter.
Wednesday’s incident isn’t the first time a flight has been behind schedule thanks to an animal invasion.
In 2021, five planes were delayed after a turtle found its way onto the tarmac at Tokyo’s Narita international airport, and in 2019, a baby hedgehog crossing the runway disrupted a passenger plane’s takeoff from the Scottish highlands.
Meanwhile, a Norwegian flight from London to Austin, Texas, was delayed in 2019 by distressed emotional support dogs on board the plane.
