Flight aborted due to safety concerns, after insect flew into one of the aircraft’s instruments after it took off from Southampton

This article is more than 5 years old

This article is more than 5 years old

An aeroplane flown by airline Flybe heading to Dublin was forced to turn back after a bee became lodged inside its instruments.

The insect flew into one of the instruments on the outside of the jet shortly after it took off from Southampton on Friday.

The pilots, spotting the technical issue, turned the plane around and landed without difficulty, a Flybe spokeswoman confirmed.

After the passengers had disembarked, engineers checked the plane from flight BE384 and discovered the rogue bee causing the problem.

The spokeswoman said that Flybe was sorry for delaying their customers but added that the airline had to ensure all their planes were safe.

It is not the first time bees have affected aircraft. Last year, a swarm of the flying insects clouded the cockpit windows of a domestic flight in the United States and began being sucked into the aircraft’s engines.

The pilots returned the aircraft to the ground safely, but passengers told local media the plane was filled with a burning smell.

Wasps were at fault for an air tragedy 20 years earlier in the Dominican Republic.

A Boeing 757 carrying 189 people crashed five minutes after taking off in February 1996 because the pitot tube – which measures the speed of an aeroplane – had become blocked by a wasps nest.

Confused by the incorrect airspeed readings, the pilot accidentally stalled the plane before it went into a spin and crashed into the sea, killing all on board.