Ebola Comment Creates Scare on Philly-Based Flight

Hazmat team greets plane at destination.

A man on a Wednesday flight from Philadelphia to the Dominican Republic said he had the Ebola virus — apparently as a joke with unintended consequences.

NBC 10 reports:

A man on a flight that left Philadelphia for an island paradise triggered a caught-on-camera Ebola scare on his plane when he reportedly said “I have Ebola.”

US Airways Flight 845 left Philadelphia en route to Punta Cana, Dominican Republic, just after 10 a.m. Wednesday. When it arrived shortly after 1 p.m. local time, passengers were told to stay on the plane as crews in hazmat suits came onto the aircraft.

See the video above to watch the hazmat team enter the plant.

CBS Philly said the man’s comments were probably a joke. The station quoted Dr. Amesh Adalja of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center.

“From the medical perspective this seems like a joke, a hoax, that really went badly. I would really advise people to take this seriously because Ebola is no joke and people are very anxious about it,” he said.

The passengers were let off the plane about two hours after it landed.