Flight diverted to Mumbai as woman gives birth on board

mumbai — An Indonesia woman delivered a baby girl on board an Etihad Airways flight from Abu Dhabi to Jakarta, early on Wednesday morning, officials said here. The flight had to be diverted to Mumbai.

Flight EY 474 left the emirate for Indonesia’s capital in the early hours of Wednesday but was diverted to India’s commercial hub after the woman went into labour mid-air, a Mumbai airport spokesperson told AFP.

“The passenger delivered a female child about 40 minutes before landing” in Mumbai, the spokesperson said.

A waiting team of medicos attended to the woman and her infant immediately after landing and provided medical assistance to stabilise the situation.

Later, the passenger was shifted in an ambulance to Seven Hills Hospital, Andheri east for further treatment and she is now recuperating with her newborn baby in the women’s ward.

Owing to the medical emergency the flight EY-474 was delayed by at least two hours before departing for its destination at 9.42am, said an official spokesperson. Last year an Indian women gave birth on a Jet Airways flight from Damman in Saudi Arabia to Kochi in the southern Indian state of Kerala. The flight was also diverted to Mumbai. Jet Airways said it was the first time a baby had been born on one of its flights and that it had given the boy free travel for life on the airline. —