A Delta Air Lines flight was rerouted Friday morning after a passenger threatened to blow up the plane, screamed "get behind me Satan" and sprayed passengers with water from a beverage-cart bottle, according to a complaint filed in federal court. Flight attendants and other passengers on Delta Flight 2148 struggled to restrain the "erratic and dangerous" passenger with seat belts and plastic handcuffs | A pack, not a herd. Well done, all! |
The plane, which was flying from Los Angeles, California, to Tampa, Florida, landed in Albuquerque at 3:37 a.m. ET, the Transportation Security Administration said. The passenger, Stanley Dwayne Sheffield, was taken into custody shortly afterward. Law enforcement swept the plane and found nothing suspicious, TSA said. The flight landed in Tampa at about 9:20 a.m. ET, more than three hours after its scheduled arrival.
The complaint said Sheffield, 46, was heading back to his first-class seat from the plane's bathroom when he grabbed a 2-liter water bottle from a drink cart, began spraying passengers and shouted "get behind me Satan." The complaint said that after a flight attendant asked him to return to his seat Sheffield threatened: "I am going to bring this plane down. ... You need to land this plane or I'm going to blow it up [and] I will blow up this plane and take you all with me." Passengers "engaged Sheffield in a struggle and restrained him" when he approached the cockpit door, the complaint said.
CNN affiliate KRQE-TV in Albuquerque reported the passenger was a 46-year-old man who allegedly made threats, damaged a bathroom and attempted to enter the flight deck when seven passengers restrained him. The man was treated for minor injuries he sustained during the struggle and later was turned over to the FBI, the report said.