A Boeing 787 on a Transatlantic flight turned around after 8 of its 9 bathrooms stopped working

14.02.2024 - 15:17 / insider.com / Airlines

Eight of the nine bathrooms on a Boeing 787 Dreamliner stopped working on a Transatlantic flight, forcing the pilots to turn around.

The KLM Boeing 787 Dreamliner carrying more than 200 passengers took off from Amsterdam on Monday for Los Angeles, airlive.net reported.

Soon after takeoff flight attendants realized that just one bathroom on the plane was working.

Data from Flightradar24 suggests the pilots first considered heading back to Amsterdam about an hour into the flight. The plane did a circle north of the UK before the pilots decided to continue on.

But two hours later, the jet did a U-turn over Greenland and returned to Amsterdam — meaning passengers had a 6½-hour flight to nowhere.

Simple Flying reports KLM then replaced the 787 with another one, which departed from Amsterdam nine hours later than originally scheduled.

The plane with the faulty restrooms appears to have been fixed overnight, as it flew to Houston and back on Tuesday, per Flightradar24.

KLM did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

Planes diverting due to faulty toilets isn't unheard of.

Last April, 300 Austrian Airlines passengers had to rebook their flights after five of the eight toilets wouldn't flush properly.

And in 2018, a Norwegian flight, which ironically had 85 plumbers on board, had to return to the airport due to malfunctioning toilets.