An emotional Australian couple have recalled how they were forced to sit beside a dead body for hours after a woman died on their long-haul flight.
Mitchell Ring and Jennifer Colin were on a Qatar Airways flight from Melbourne to Venice when the woman suddenly collapsed in the aisle beside their row.
Despite the efforts of the cabin crew, she was unable to be revived.
‘Unfortunately, the lady couldn’t be saved, which was pretty heartbreaking to watch,’ Mr Ring told A Current Affair.
‘Then they went to try and move her, they bought this chair down… and they put her in this chair, and they tried to wheel her up towards business class.
‘But she was quite a large lady, and they couldn’t get her through the aisle.’
Crew members noticed there were vacant seats on both sides of the couple and asked them to move over to make room for the woman.
The body was stored beside Mr Ring, covered in blankets, for the remaining four hours of the flight to Doha in the Middle East.
The Melbourne couple were forced to sit in close proximity with a body (pictured) after a woman collapsed in the aisleway after a trip to the bathroom
Mr Ring and his wife Jennifer Colin said neither Qantas or Qatar had reached out to them
For Ms Colin, who is a nervous flyer, the ordeal was traumatising.
‘When my husband turned around and said, “move, move”, I was pretty shocked and I said, “are they going to put her there?”,’ she said.
Luckily, a woman with a spare seat in another row invited Ms Colin to sit with her after they claim the cabin crew failed to offer to relocate them further away from the body.
To make matters worse, they were forced to wait even after the plane had touched down in Doha as police and medical officers boarded.
Mr Ring said the crews began taking the blankets off the body and inspecting it while he and his wife were sitting there, meaning he saw the woman’s face.
‘I can’t believe they told us to stay… it wasn’t nice,’ he said.
‘They have a duty of care towards their customers as well as their staff, we should be contacted to make sure, do you need some support, do you need some counselling.
‘I don’t really know how I feel and would like to speak to somebody to make sure I’m alright.’
Qatar Airways said it is looking into the incident as the couple claimed they weren’t cared for
The couple now have mixed emotions about their dream holiday in Venice.
‘I’m trying to make the best of a pretty hard situation, but, you know, we’re on holidays so we’re really trying to have a good time,’ Ms Colin said.
Qatar Airways has since indicated it is looking into the incident.
The couple booked the flight through Qantas, which said it would also reach out.
‘Ms Colin booked tickets through Qantas and travelled with Qatar Airways, a fellow Oneworld Alliance carrier,’ a Qantas spokesperson said.
‘The process for handling incidents onboard an aircraft like this is managed by the operating airline, which in this case is Qatar Airways.’
