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Former flight attendant turned travel expert Jane Hawkes has told the Mirror what really happens if a passenger dies aboard an aircraft, while dispelling one widely circulated myth

A former flight attendant has opened up about what really happens should a passenger die at 30,000 feet, and the strict procedures crew members must adhere to.

Sadly, the fact is, we will all die one day, and we cannot always decide where this final parting with take place. With thousands of travellers jetting all across the world every day, it’s of course inevitable that not everybody who boards will reach their destination with their eyes still open. Fortunately, should such a sad event come to pass, you’ll be in good hands with the cabin crew, who will be specially trained to deal with this sort of onboard tragedy with care, dignity, and above all, discretion.

The Mirror heard from travel expert Jane Hawkes. Now a consumer champion, who specialises in travel, in a former life, Jane worked as a stewardess for a major UK airline. And as you might imagine from a job dealing with people from all walks of life amid the clouds, Jane, like all those in her profession, has to be prepared for the unexpected at all times.

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Discussing the skills required of all those who serve in the sky, Jane, from Gloucestershire, told the Mirror: “They’d have to go through aviation medical training to provide CPR if needed, to provide basic first aid, at least onboard an aircraft.” Within this training, flight attendants are also warned that there may be occasions when they are unable to resuscitate a passenger, after which point they will need to deal with a very different set of protocols.

According to Jane, who is now a Consumer Champion at ladyjaney.co.uk : “Obviously, if the passenger cannot be resuscitated, is showing no signs of life, then they would ask if there was a doctor or medical professional onboard because it’s not a crew decision to officially pronounce death. They would ask for a medical doctor, and they would then move them to a less visible area if possible. It could well be that the aeroplane is full. If the aeroplane is full, if all seats are taken, then they will just have to keep the body in the seat that it’s in, perhaps move it to the side, So at least move it somewhere so it’s in a side position if possible, because obviously, we dont want to be heavinga body around from one side of the aircraft to another and then cover the body.”

The crew will then make sure to wrap the deceased in blankets “as much as possible”, with a focus on preserving “dignity”. Jane explained: “Bodies, obviously, after they’re deceased, they’re not the nicest things to be around, and that’s the priorities, it’s safety and dignity. This is not a safety issue; this is a dignity issue in many respects, and it is unfortunate, of course, if it’s a long flight because that body will remain in situ for quite a long period of time.”

As challenging as this situation might be, Jane says it’s “very, very, almost completely unlikely” that the plane would divert in this instance, for a whole host of reasons, especially that, with no life left to save, this wouldn’t be considered a medical emergency. Indeed, it’s far more likely that the flight will continue on its intended journey, with the crew left to deal with the practical realities of having a body on a plane. This will naturally involve making sure to keep other passengers relaxed and as in the dark as possible about what’s going on.

Jane emphasised: “It’s kept very, very discreet, about as discreet as you can possibly do in the circumstances. Particularly if you’re the person who ends up sitting next to said body, which is still a possibility. They move people around as much as they possibly can, but you can’t magic seats up out of nowhere.”

In the course of her own career, Jane has had colleagues who’ve had to deal with this sort of heartbreaking situation, dealing with it by moving the deceased to a “less visible area” if possible, which may include the crew rest area. Meanwhile, passengers are given “very little information”, and may simply be alerted that there’s been a medical situation, with no further details.

Encouraging people to show compassion in this sort of devastating situation, Jane noted, “They will speculate, you see, this is it. People do speculate, and I think it’s quite worrying in that kind of instance. I think if anybody is on a plane and this happens, or they suspect that it’s happened, then just maybe bear in mind the dignity of the deceased and also those travelling with them. Because it may well be that there’s someone else. If you’re thinking about someone elderly, this was an elderly passenger that I’m thinking if in particular, it can happen anywhere at any time, but it happened on an aircraft.”

For many of us, this isn’t where we’d choose to spend our final moments, but Jane hopes that passengers will be reassured by the professionalism of the crew, who will be looking out for them “when the chips are down”. Of course, as pointed out by Jane, such instances demonstrate just how vital this sort of job actually is, with stewards and stewardesses being far more than simply “glorified hostesses in the air”. Stressing just how varied this role can be, Jane told us: “They are primarily there for your safety and well-being, and things like this are part and parcel of it. Sometimes they’re judge and juries, sometimes you’ve got restraint. So it’s much more than just serving you tea and coffee. In fact, that is just the fluffy bit that goes on top.”

On this topic, Jane has addressed rumours that flight attendants will go to extreme lengths to make it appear as though a deceased individual is still alive, perhaps “putting a hat on them so they can look at the TV or something.” As per Jane, nothing could be further from the truth. Jane said: “The crew are just going to keep it as simple and dignified as possible. You know, they’re not going to create a drama, a scenario where it looks like someone is still there. So I think, maybe dark glasses and a hat aren’t going to be the case. Looking towards the screen, positioned, you know it’s just not going to happen.”

Once the wheels hit tarmac, the crew face another challenge in terms of getting passengers disembarked safely and calmly, while continuing to preserve the privacy of the deceased and any loved ones who’d been travelling with them. It’s at this point that the emergency services will come on board. Outlining this process, Jane shared: “It could be, it depends on the procedures at whatever destination it is, it’s most likely that they would get the passengers off, and then they’d remove the deceased. So that is the most likely outcome. However, so people may notice then, while they’re getting their things together, that something’s not moving. So that may be noticed.

“But it could be, it could potentially happen that the body might go off first. But I think the best thing to state is that the emergency services will board and then the body will be taken off the aircraft. But passengers are usually allowed to leave their seats first. So you’ll clear the aircraft, and then you’ll deal with that.” She added, “In a medical emergency, you’d all be staying seated, and the medical and the passenger would go off first. So people might start to think, ‘it’s a medical situation they’ve come on the aircraft, but they’re waiting for us to get off first. They might think that’s a bit odd. But then they’ll realise perhaps there’s a bit more of a serious medical situation.”

Of course, once the body is off the plane, there will be further responsibilities to face, including a potential repatriation process. While it’s an ending few would imagine for themselves or a loved one, there is comfort to be found in knowing that, should the worst come to pass, cabin crew will be prepared and equipped to deal with such a sensitive situation.

Do you have a story to share? Email me at julia.banim@reachplc.com

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If you’re reading this review of Gore Verbinski’s maniacal farce “Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die” in newsprint, congratulations on being a Luddite.

But if you’re reading it on a smartphone, then you’re one of the suckers that Sam Rockwell is hoping to reach when his unnamed time traveler barges into a late-night Los Angeles diner screaming, “I am from the future and all of this goes horribly wrong!” The patrons pause scrolling to glance at this unhinged, unwashed man wearing a crown of computer wires wrapped around his head like an IT messiah. Then they get a good look at his shoes when he stomps on their tables, kicking cheeseburgers as he tries to make these regular folks engage with the tech-pocalypse he swears is coming.

It’s a sermon we’ve heard plenty of times before and possibly even delivered ourselves. Coming from the ever-charismatic Rockwell, a lecture to stop wasting our lives online sounds no more insurmountable, only more immediate.

Half of the world will die, he foretells. The other half will be too distracted to notice. That is, unless a handful of strangers join him right now, right this moment, to fight for humanity’s cerebral freedom. Unsurprisingly, volunteers don’t raise their hands. (The one eager guy who does has failed him too often in other scenarios.) But Rockwell’s time traveler — he really is one — is used to a firewall of resistance. He’s given this speech at this diner 117 times. Some combination of the 47 people in it is fated to succeed.

That opening scene sounds as if an AI merged “The Terminator” with “Groundhog Day.” True, Matthew Robinson’s funny, savage and surprising script doesn’t downplay its inspirations. (He even lets Rockwell rip off Indiana Jones’ line about snakes.) But the screenplay gets so intricate and angry — and so shamelessly ambitious — you can’t believe someone in today’s Hollywood was willing to put up the money to get it made. Even helmed by proven hitmaker Verbinski of the “Pirates of the Caribbean” franchise, it’s a feat akin to convincing someone to fund a skyscraper-sized cuckoo clock that has a bird that pops out and heckles the crowd.

Eventually, a dubious crew enlists: public school teachers Mark and Janet (Michael Peña and Zazie Beetz), grouchy ride-share driver Scott (Asim Chaudhry), assistant Boy Scout leader Bob (Daniel Barnett), jittery mom Susan (Juno Temple) and forlorn Maria (Georgia Goodman), who keeps sighing that all she wanted was a slice of pie. Rockwell also impulsively yokes in Ingrid (Haley Lu Richardson), a grungy girl in a princess dress, who seems to be on her own suicide mission. The actors are mostly just pegs in a complicated plot, but they snap into place well.

The man from the future doesn’t have a plan — and worse, he considers himself the only person who isn’t expendable. The others can die (and do). As the group shuffles toward catastrophe, Verbinski intercuts their mission with flashbacks to their civilian lives. Their ordinary days, the digital indignities they’ve borne, that’s where Verbinski really gets mean.

The film’s feints and twists are fabulous as they explore how the internet’s promise has soured. One plotline involves a corporate brainstorm to make people love and nurture their own talking adbot, essentially a human-sized Tamagotchi. In another, school shootings have become such an epidemic that when Temple’s Susan gets summoned to identify her ninth-grader’s corpse, the other grieving mothers at the station calmly chitchat about traffic until one glances over at her nonchalantly and says, “First time?”

At first, the not-so-original idea that phones have turned children into zombies is a Romero-style parody of brain rot. (The young actor Cassiel Eatock-Winnik has a great scene as a vicious teen who stares down one of her elders and says, “You’re 35? That’s, like, older than most trees.”) But Verbinski reveals an unexpected angle of attack: Here, society has groomed the next generation to behave like machines. We don’t know why, exactly, but we can imagine a few reasons.

Even coping mechanisms take fire. Susan meets more parents who’ve snapped under the strain and become nihilistic trolls raising their daughter to be toxic so it won’t matter as much if she dies. Another character is quick to insist that everything he’s looking at — the walls, the people — is a facade. A 20-something gig worker named Tim (Tom Taylor) wants to permanently live in a VR simulation. His story is a little rushed but we get the idea that Tim’s not a jerk, just an idealist who can’t handle the tawdriness of the 21st century. As he puts it, “Why would I choose this world over that one?”

Verbinski doesn’t say much outright about the creeping concern that we’re living in a highly surveilled, aggressive and unpredictable police state. He’s able to make that point without words when cops arrive and our heroes-slash-hostages, none of whom have yet done anything worse than skip out on their bill, all assume the itchy trigger finger of the law will shoot them on sight. (And they’re right.) He also makes an ominous refrain of “Thank you for your service.”

It’s easier to howl at a classic like “Dr. Strangelove,” which mocked the leaders giddyuping the planet’s destruction, than at a present-day satire where we ourselves are the joke. As with “Idiocracy” (and eventually “Eddington”), our ability to fully appreciate this merciless, furious comedy might take a decade of remove. Even then, though, I won’t like James Whitaker’s cinematography, which goes for a deliberate ugliness but just looks dishwater drab.

“Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die” anticipates the audience’s resistance. We do think for ourselves and so we scour the movie for flaws that will justify the urge to roll our eyes. For example: Why does Rockwell let some characters die and not others? Is the movie just as shallow as its j’accuse of us? Some quibbles get answered. Larger questions are left coyly unresolved so that we leave the theater uneasy.

There are so many overwhelming ideas in “Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die” that, at over two hours, it does have the sense of a dissociative doomscroll. There’s even a plot point involving an algorithmic overlord that creates randomly generated armies: “Ghostbusters” with AI slop. The normie survivors try to convince themselves it might send something good, like they’re thumbing TikTok hoping for a treasure worth the time. Rockwell assures them it won’t. Nothing good will ever come. And what does arrive is so hellacious that it makes the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man look sweet.

The film is too cynical to take itself that seriously; Verbinski would roll his eyes at any thoughts and prayers it could do much good. Yet, anyone born with “19” at the start of their birthyear still remembers how it felt to leave the house without a black rectangle in their hands. That makes us all time travelers of a sort, too, beacons of an increasingly distant era in which it was possible to be unplugged.

But it’s OK if you’re on your screen right now. Just sit before a bigger one to see this film.

John Mayer calls it “adult day care”: the historic recording studio behind the arched gates on La Brea Avenue where famous musicians have been keeping themselves — and one another — creatively occupied since the mid-1960s. Known for decades as Henson Studios — and as A&M Studios before that — the 3-acre complex in the heart of Hollywood has played host to the creation of some of music’s most celebrated records, among them Carole King’s “Tapestry,” Joni Mitchell’s “Blue,” Guns N’ Roses’ “Use Your Illusion” and D’Angelo’s “Black Messiah.” Charlie Chaplin, who was born in London, began building the lot in 1917 in a white-and-brown English Tudor style; he went on to direct some of his best-known films, including “Modern Times” and “The Great Dictator,” on the property. In 1966, Herb Alpert and Jerry Moss bought the place and made it the base for their A&M Records; they converted two of the lot’s soundstages into high-end recording studios that drew the likes of Sergio Mendes, the Carpenters, Stevie Nicks, U2 and John Lennon.

In 1985, A&M’s parquet-floored Studio A was where Quincy Jones gathered the all-star congregation that recorded “We Are the World” in a marathon overnight session; in 2014, Daft Punk evoked the studios’ wood-paneled splendor in a performance of “Get Lucky” with Stevie Wonder at the 56th Grammy Awards.

Now, with an eye on preserving the spot at a moment of widespread upheaval in the entertainment industry, Mayer and his business partner, the filmmaker McG, have finalized a purchase of the lot, which they bought for $44 million from the family of the late Muppets creator Jim Henson and which they’ve renamed Chaplin Studios in honor of the silent-film giant who broke ground on it more than a century ago.

SACRAMENTO — As massive federal cuts are upending the healthcare system in California, analysts and healthcare professionals are urging state lawmakers to soften the blow by creating new revenue streams and helping residents navigate through the newly-imposed red tape.

“It impacts not only uninsured but also Medicare and commercially insured patients who rely on the same system,” said Dolly Goel, a physician and chief officer for the Santa Clara Valley Healthcare Administration. “People will die.”

Goel was among more than a dozen speakers this week at a state Assembly Health Committee hearing held to collect input on how to address cuts enacted by a Republican-backed tax and spending bill signed last year by President Trump. The committee’s Republican members — Assemblymembers Phillip Chen of Yorba Linda, Natasha Johnson of Lake Elsinore, Joe Patterson of Rockin, and Kate Sanchez of Trabuco Canyon — did not attend.

The so-called “Big, Beautiful Bill” passed by Republicans shifts federal funding away from safety-net programs and toward tax cuts and immigration enforcement. A recent report from the Legislative Analyst’s Office, which advises the state Legislature on budgetary issues, estimated this will reduce funding for healthcare by “tens of billions of dollars” in California and warned about 1.2 million people could lose coverage through Medi-Cal, the state’s version of the federal Medicaid program providing healthcare coverage to low-income Americans.

Congress allowed enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies to expire, which is dramatically increasing the cost of privately-purchased health insurance. Covered California, the state’s Affordable Care Act health insurance marketplace, estimates hundreds of thousands of Californians will either be stripped of coverage or drop out due to increased cost.

Sandra Hernández, president of the California Health Care Foundation, said the federal legislation creates administrative hurdles, requiring Medicaid beneficiaries to meet new work or income requirements and to undergo the eligibility re-determination process every six months instead of annually.

“We are looking at a scenario where otherwise eligible working parents lose their coverage simply because they aren’t able to navigate a complex verification process in a timely way,” she said.

California should move aggressively to automate verification instead of putting the burden of proof on beneficiaries, Hernández said. She advised legislators to center new healthcare strategies around technology, like artificial intelligence and telehealth services, to improve efficiency and keep costs down.

“While the federal landscape has shifted, California has enormous power to mitigate the damage,” said Hernández. “California has had a long tradition of taking care of its own.”

Hannah Orbach-Mandel, an analyst with the California Budget and Policy Center, said legislators should establish new revenue sources.

“A common sense place to start is by eliminating corporate tax loopholes and ensuring that highly profitable corporations pay their fair share in state taxes,” she said, adding that California loses out on billions annually because of the “water’s edge” tax provision, which allows multinational corporations to exclude the income of their foreign subsidiaries from state taxation.

One proposal to raise money for state healthcare benefits already is raising controversy. Under the Billionaire Tax Act, Californians worth more than $1 billion would pay a one-time 5% tax on their total wealth. The Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West, the union behind the act, said the measure would raise much-needed money for healthcare, education and food assistance programs. It is opposed by Gov. Gavin Newsom, among others.

During last week’s legislative hearing in Sacramento, other speakers stressed the importance of communicating clearly with the public, collaborating with nonprofits and county governments and bracing for an influx of hospital patients.

Those who lose health insurance will skip medications and primary care and subsequently get sicker and end up in the emergency room, explained Goel. She said this will strain hospital staff and lead to longer wait times and delayed care for all patients.

The federal cuts come at a time when California is struggling with its own budgetary woes. The Legislative Analyst’s Office estimates the state will have an $18-billion budget shortfall in the upcoming fiscal year.

At the start of the hearing, Assemblymember Mia Bonta (D-Alameda) criticized the federal government for leaving states in the lurch and prioritizing immigration enforcement over healthcare.

The Republican-led Congress and the president provided a staggering funding increase to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, known as ICE. The agency’s annual budget has ballooned to $85 billion.

“The federal dollars which once supported healthcare for working families are now being funneled into mass deportation operations,” said Bonta, who chairs the committee. “Operations that resulted in tragic murders — this is where our healthcare funding is going.”

Jan. 30 (UPI) — Four Nigerien military personnel were injured and 20 attackers were killed during an attack on the Diori Hamani International Airport near Niger’s capital city, Niamey.

The attack started late Wednesday night and lasted for about 30 minutes, during which loud explosions and sustained gunfire could be heard, the BBC reported.

Niger’s Defense Ministry said 11 were arrested after the attack ended, and a French national was among the 20 attackers who were killed.

The Islamic State group on Friday claimed responsibility for coordinating the attack that it said targeted a military base used by Niger’s army.

The Islamic State’s Amaq information wing said “major damage” was done to the airport but did not cite any casualty figures.

Video footage recorded during the attack and witness statements indicate Niger’s air-defense system engaged incoming projectiles.

The airport resumed its normal operations Thursday, and Nigerien officials credited Russian military personnel with helping to fend off the attackers.

Gen. Abdourahamane Tiani, who seized power in Niger during a July 2023 military coup, appeared on state-run television, blaming the presidents of France, Benin and the Ivory Coast for the attack. Tiani did not cite any evidence to support the allegation, but he said retaliation was forthcoming.

“We have heard them bark,” Tiani said. “They should be ready to hear us roar.”

Niger recently experienced diminished relations with France and neighboring nations, which he accused of being French proxies.

Tiani and Nigerien officials have close ties with Russia, which helped the Nigerien military to thwart a rebellion by militants associated with al-Qaida and ISIS.

Niger maintains close relations with Mali and Burkina Faso, all of which have faced rebellions that have caused thousands of deaths and displaced millions.

The three nations formed the Alliance of Sahel States in response and engaged Russia while ending military ties with France.