Passengers were left confounded on the weekend with a two-hour flight to nowhere when a United Airlines flight bound for China was forced to return to San Francisco due to pilot error. The problem? A forgotten passport.
While it’s comforting to know even seasoned aviation professionals forget to pack their passports sometimes, a mid-flight realisation that your essential travel documentation did not make it onto the plane is less than ideal.
The United Airlines Boeing 787 aircraft flying from Los Angeles to Shanghai on 22 March 2025 was forced to turn around after it was discovered one of the pilots had taken off without a passport.
Flight UA198 departed LAX at around 2pm with 257 passengers and 13 crew headed for China’s largest city.
About two hours later, the United Airlines plane turned around over the Pacific Ocean and was redirected to San Francisco where it landed around 5pm local time, according to the FlightAware website.
In a statement to CNN about the United Airlines plane turnaround, an airline spokesperson said: “The pilot did not have their passport on board. We arranged for a new crew to take our customers to their destination that evening. Customers were provided with meal vouchers and compensation.”
The flight with the new crew took off from San Francisco around 9pm and landed in Shanghai about six hours behind schedule.
The disruptions didn’t stop with the UA198 flight – passengers on the returning UA199 flight from Shanghai to LAX were also impacted due to the late inbound arrival.
Affected UA198 passengers received two meal vouchers totalling USD$30 (around AUD$47.60) to use at San Francisco International Airport and could claim compensation for the travel disruption.
Read our much better inflight experience with UA from Melbourne to San Francisco here.
