'We did nothing wrong,' says airline after couple forced to sit next to dead woman for hours on long-haul flight
28 February 2025, 06:18 | Updated: 28 February 2025, 06:20
An airline whose staff kept the dead body of a passenger in the same row as a fellow traveller has claimed they handled the situation "appropriately".
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Qatar Airways said that an internal review found that its cabin crew had "acted quickly, appropriately and professionally" after the woman died during the flight from Melbourne to Venice.
Affected couple Mitchell Ring and Jennifer Colin said earlier that they were shocked by their experience.
The situation arose because after the woman died, air crew members tried to move the body up to business class, but she was too large and could not pass down the aisle.
As their next solution, air crew looked for empty seats with space around them, and found that the row where Mr Ring and Ms Colin were sitting had some vacancies. They placed the body there after asking the couple.
Ms Colin was eventually able to move away, but Mr Ring had to sit a few seats away from the corpse for the rest of the flight.
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Qatar Airways said the way the crew dealt with the situation was "in line with training and industry standard practice".
They added in a statement: "Passengers were accommodated to other seats, and a crew member was sitting at all times with the deceased passenger for the duration of the flight until landing in Doha.
"It is an unfortunate reality that unexpected deaths do sometimes occur on board aircraft across the aviation industry and our crew are highly trained to deal with these situations with as much respect and dignity as possible."
They also said they had offered support to the family of the dead woman and other affected passengers.
Recounting the situation, Ring said of staff: "They looked a bit frustrated, then they just looked at me and saw seats were available beside me, my wife was on the other side, we were in a row of four.
"They said, 'Can you move over please?' and I just said, 'Yes no problem'.
"Then they placed the lady in the chair I was in."
The woman's body was covered up with blankets.
Ms Colin, a nervous flyer, was given a spare seat on the row behind by a fellow passenger.
Mr Ring was forced to sit close to the body for the rest of the trip to Italy.
When they arrived, the couple were forced to wait further while emergency services took off the blankets that were covering up the woman.
Mr Ring added: "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."
A spokesperson for Qatar Airways said: "First and foremost our thoughts are with the family of the passenger who sadly passed away on board our flight.
"We apologise for any inconvenience or distress this incident may have caused, and are in the process of contacting passengers in line with our policies and procedures."
