Passenger Gives Birth on Southwest Airlines Flight

The Orlando-bound Southwest Airlines flight was diverted to Charleston.

ByABC News
December 5, 2016, 12:04 PM

— -- A passenger gave birth Sunday on an Orlando, Florida-bound Southwest Airlines flight, forcing the plane to make an emergency landing in Charleston, South Carolina.

Flight 556 was en route from Philadelphia when flight attendants asked for help from any medical personnel aboard the flight. Two doctors and a nurse went to the front row of the plane to help the woman in labor, who was not named, according to fellow passenger Izzy Gould.

Gould, director of content at AL.com, posted a short video on Twitter in which the newborn can be heard crying at the front of the plane.

Gould told ABC News he felt the flight take a sharp turn and then tracked the flight online to see they would be landing in Charleston. He estimated there was a 15- to 20-minute time period from when the plane turned until they were on the ground in Charleston.

The plane was met by rescue crews, who boarded the plane to escort the woman and the baby off it. There was also a male passenger traveling with the mother and baby, according to Gould.

The woman and her baby were "doing well when they left the aircraft," Southwest Airlines told ABC News in a statement today. The airline added it "do[es] not have a status on their condition" as of today.

Gould said a flight attendant told him the female passenger was 26 weeks pregnant when her water broke on the flight.

Gould called the flight “memorable” in a later tweet and described the Southwest crew and passengers who jumped up to help as “true pros.”