A stowaway was found alive and in critical condition in the underbelly of an aircraft at Paris airport on Thursday morning, Reuters reports.
The plane was travelling from the western Algerian city of Oran, a two-and-a-half hour flight from Paris. The man is in a life-threatening condition and is being treated at a nearby hospital.
Stowaways in the unpressurised cabin and cargo compartments of aircraft can face temperatures of minus 50 to minus 60 degrees Celsius (minus 58 degrees Fahrenheit), as well as a lack of oxygen.
In 2015, the body of a stowaway on a British Airways flight from Johannesburg to Heathrow fell onto a shop in Richmond, south-west London. A second stowaway survived the 10-hour flight and was found in the aircraft’s undercarriage.
In 2019, the body of an alleged stowaway fell hundreds of metres from a plane flying over south-west London and landed in the garden of a man’s home after failing to spot him as he sunbathed.
