Mumbai-bound Ethiopian Airlines' Dreamliner makes emergency landing after mid-air depressurisation; 7 fall ill

In what was another scare in the skies for the passengers, an Ethiopian Airlines flight headed to Mumbai from Addis Ababa was forced to make an emergency landing in the city at 1:42 am on Friday after a cabin depressurisation incident occurred mid-air, The Times of India reported Saturday.

The incident took place aboard flight ET640, operated by a Boeing 787 Dreamliner (registration ET-AXS), while cruising at 33,000 feet over the Arabian Sea.

The aircraft experienced a loss of cabin pressure, prompting the pilots to execute a rapid descent to a safer altitude, according to data from Flightradar24.


"On landing, seven passengers were attended to by the airport medical team for decompression-related symptoms, out of which one required hospitalisation," a source told TOI.

This is the second such incident reported in less than a week. On June 23, eleven people, including six crew members, felt unwell on board an Air India Boeing 777 flying from London Heathrow to Mumbai.
The airline has launched a probe into that case.

Cabin depressurisation refers to the loss of air pressure inside the aircraft cabin. Commercial aircraft fly at altitudes where natural oxygen levels are too low for humans to survive. To ensure safety, the cabin is sealed and pressurised using air from the engines, which is cooled and mixed with fresh oxygen to maintain breathable conditions.

If this system fails due to a technical fault or structural issue, the air pressure inside the cabin drops suddenly, leading to potential symptoms such as dizziness, nausea, shortness of breath, or loss of consciousness.

In such events, oxygen masks automatically deploy from overhead compartments to help passengers breathe until the aircraft descends to a safer altitude.

The latest emergency also comes at a time when India’s aviation sector is already on alert following a fatal crash earlier this month involving an Air India Dreamliner aircraft. The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has since intensified safety audits and unplanned inspections across airline fleets and airports.

(With inputs from TOI)