Megan Reinertsen has apologized for an incident on a United Airlines flight that saw her evacuated after she urgently needed to use the restroom. Share this article Share this article Facebook X LinkedIn Reddit Bluesky Email Copy link Link copied Bookmark Comments
A United Airlines passenger who developed “biological diarrhea” that led to a flight cancellation blamed it on an undercooked hamburger.
Actress Megan Reinertsen, 29, from Atlanta, Georgia, shared that she spent 90 minutes in the toilet during a flight from Newark to Indianapolis in July 2024.
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She shared her experience on TikTok a month ago and then confirmed the details in an interview with the Daily Mail on Thursday. The news comes as an emergency recall of six salads has been announced over food poisoning concerns.
Reinertsen admitted that her biggest mistake was eating an undercooked cutlet, which led to severe food poisoning.
“I ate part of an undercooked burger a few hours before leaving for Indiana,” she said.
“I only took a couple of bites because I thought, 'Ugh, this is completely undercooked.'”
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She noted that she bought the burger at the resort where she worked as a nanny for a family on vacation.
“I don't want to leave this resort,” she said. “It was a really nice hotel.”
The first symptoms appeared as she was walking through the airport before her last connecting flight, which was scheduled to take two hours.
“My stomach started to rumble,” she told the Daily Mail. “I thought, 'This… is wrong.'”
“But it wasn't until the second flight that the pain really started. I thought, 'This isn't good.'
In a TikTok video of the horror experience, she said that 30 minutes after takeoff she was sweating, crying and doubled over in pain.
Fearing a repeat of the fate of a famous Delta passenger who soiled herself mid-flight, Reinertsen made it to the restroom just in time.
“For the next 20 minutes I had the kind of diarrhea that no human being should ever experience in their entire life,” she said, adding that she soon began vomiting.
Panicked in the cramped, claustrophobic space, she called for help from flight attendants, who brought her bags.
The crew allowed her to remain in the toilet for the entire flight, receiving special permission from the pilot so that she could remain there during landing.
@meghanreinertsen Part 1 of how I finally got my United flight cancelled #story #plane #diarrhea @United Airlines ♬ original audio – Megan Reinertsen
Reflecting on the incident, Megan said: “The flight attendant came up to us and said, 'Everyone off the plane, take your time and come out when you can, the next flight is cancelled.' At that point, I didn't think it was related to me.”
The flight attendant then informed her that a hazmat team would be arriving shortly to clean up her mess.
“I see, so you cancelled the flight because of me… because you don't know if I brought anything from Portugal. I'm a biohazard. I'm patient zero.”
Megan spoke openly about her experience on TikTok last month, noting that the incident took place in July 2024 but was so humiliating that she has found it difficult to travel since.
The video has received more than 20 million views on Megan's TikTok account.
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