Air France flight AF898 was forced to return to Paris CDG Airport due to a cell phone stuck in the cargo hold.
The Boeing 777-300ER with registration F-GSQX departed Paris CDG Airport at 15:07 CET Thursday, February 6 2025.
The flight AF898 to Fort-de-France was cruising at 31,000 ft when it was about to start crossing the Atlantic Ocean when the crew declared an emergency (squawk 7700) and started to circle about 40 minutes into the flight.
Pilots finally decided to return to Paris CDG as a female passenger has dropped her cell phone in the galley area. The phone went through a grate, then fell into the cargo hold. Lithium battery may have been altered when the phone dropped so the crew didn’t want to take the risk of a fire during the flight.
The Boeing aircraft landed back at 17:18 (local time) and maintenance team had to remove two pallets to finally find the woman’s phone.
The 471 passengers resumed their flight to Martinique on the same plane which took off at 18:49 and landed at 22:39 more than 2 hours late.
