Air France flight 378 from Paris to Detroit diverted to Montreal on Wednesday, with passengers reportedly being told that U.S. authorities refused to allow the aircraft to land in the U.S. because of a “virus” issue.
The Boeing 777-200 was reportedly barred from entering the U.S. after officials became aware of a virus onboard.
Today’s flight (5/20/26) is being rerouted mid flight. Announcement was US authorities are not allowing us to land in Detroit. FA mentioned something about a virus and they have masks on.
They turned off all WiFi 54 mins before arrival. Now telling us to remain seated until the agreement of the Canadian authorities.
A later announcement said there were no aircraft issues and that the diversion was “solely at the direction of US authorities.”
The passenger account says the crew referred to “something about a virus” and that flight attendants had masks on. The customer, seated in busienss class, reported that anyone who had their own mask put it on “most likely bc the crew suddenly all have them on.” Onboard service was suspended after the diversion announcement (the business class pre-arrival meal was not served).
It appears Air France plans to operate the plane from Montreal to Detroit, after addressing issues on the ground in Canada.
I haven’t been able to find any official statements on the status of the flight. However, this comes amidst new travel restrictions related to Bundibugyo, a virus that can cause Ebola. That’s not confirmed as the specific issue on this flight.
However, on Monday the Centers for Disease Control said that they, Homeland Security and other agencies had implemented “enhanced travel screening, entry restrictions, and public health measures” to prevent Ebola from entering the U.S. as a result of outbreaks in East and Central Africa.
- Entry restrictions on non-U.S. passport holders who had been in Uganda, the Democratic Republic of Congo, or South Sudan in the previous 21 days
- Coordination with airlines, international partners, and port of entry officials.
On Tuesday, CDC said they were coordinating testing, contact tracing, border screening, PPE, and disease response in the DRC and Uganda. (It’s not clear how keeping only non-U.S. passport holders who had been in these places out helps, except that authority to bar U.S. passports from entry is on weaker ground.)
We don’t know if there was an infected passenger or an exposed passenger on this flight, or a passenger who may have triggered travel-restriction criteria who had been allowed to board, or even just a passenger manifest issue where it wasn’t clear whether a passenger may have been allowed or not, exposed or not.
It’s also not entirely clear whether the U.S. refused “airspace” as I’ve seen claimed, or refused landing at a U.S. airport. The aircraft did fly over Maine enroute to Montreal.
(HT: Paddle Your Own Kanoo)
Looks like the flight continued on to Detroit, presumably after deplaning the sick passenger.
Probably shouldn’t have abandoned USAID, or left the WHO, or defunded the CDC, or vilified scientists and doctors, or… re-elected a horribly corrupt convict felon who tried over overthrow an election with an insurrection… but, I’m sure some ‘patriot’ (who is totally based in the US) is about to correct me, and diagnose me with a fake-illness… Enjoy the higher prices on fuel, food, housing, healthcare, and all the layoffs!
Sounds like a veiled attempt to keep black people out of….Detroit
@ 1990 — But, but…..no taxes!
News reports indicated the passenger had originated in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and that out of an abundance of caution the pax was not allowed entry into the US
And how exactly does being a US Citizen and having a US passport provide Ebola immunity ?
Oh that’s right our glorious dictator also “shut it down by stopping Chinese citizens entering the US at the beginning of Covid” See how that turned out !
@Gene — But, but… bigotry. *sigh*
Ah! @1990 how you inspire so beautifully what I’d have said to engage perfect responses. Thank you.
@Joan Eisenstodt — *salute*
It’s far too often ‘View from the Right Wing’ on here. Gotta keep reminding folks that we need two wings to fly. (And better leadership in the WH and Congress so that we don’t crash…)
Why did Canada have to let the airplane land there? Send it back to Paris. Top up the fuel if necessary. Quarantine all those without a mask.
Just saw this on a newsletter from the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health. Looks like the US government decided to “do something” whether it was useful and sensible, or not:
The challenges of travel restrictions: Counter to the WHO’s recommendations to avoid travel restrictions outside the affected region, on May 18, the CDC announced entry restrictions on non-U.S. passport holders who have been in Uganda, DRC, or South Sudan in the previous 21 days—a move that was met with concern from the Africa CDC.
“Travel bans make it very hard to actually get things into the outbreak zone,” Adalja noted, adding that it’s more important to prioritize targeted screening and rapid deployment of resources.
A global response has been activated: The WHO has deployed technical teams and emergency funding, while Africa CDC and partner organizations are coordinating regional surveillance, contact tracing, and laboratory support. Paul Spiegel told Newsweek that authorities in the DRC and Uganda have “decades of experience in Ebola outbreaks,” and that both African CDC and U.S. CDC personnel are actively engaged in response operations on the ground.
The risk to Americans right now is low, Spiegel told Newsweek, as Ebola is not airborne and Bundibugyo spreads only through contact with the bodily fluids of people who are already symptomatic.
If an infected American traveler or healthcare worker does come home with the virus, the U.S. has around 13 Ebola treatment centers that “can handle the highest level of biocontainment,” Adalja told ABC News. “We are prepared for this. We learned these lessons back in the 2013–2014 Ebola outbreak in West Africa.”
Nonetheless, sweeping cuts to public health infrastructure in the U.S. have made us “worse off now to handle infectious disease threats than at the start of COVID-19,” Gigi Gronvall told The Guardian. “Even a couple of cases [of Ebola] in the U.S. would be challenging with our current workforce,” she said.
@drrichard — Thank you for sharing that. Ebola is no joke. After reading The Hot Zone, I’m legitimately scared if we ever have an actual uncontrolled outbreak here. Chapter 13 vividly describes how this pathogen dissolves our internal organs. When the lining of the intestines gives way, the author equates the internal sound to that of a bedsheet being violently torn. Then there’s the black vomit…
Omg seriously? Their silly face diapers will have ZERO effectiveness against “a virus”. Have people not learned the truth in the 6 years since the Vhina virus Plandemic?
I’m sure Bobby has got this. I also feel more safe that my bff is a virologist. Last time I was at NIH. they did have one death and one locally community transmitted case. ( nurse ) She survived but just barely.
@jns, Canada did not have to let the plane land, they chose to let it land. Probably because public health in Canada is not headed up by a lunatic and staffed with TV personalities, it is run by medical professionals who are aware of how this spreads and that there was no danger to letting the plane land
@1990, it is Trump’s fault that people in Uganda are getting Ebola. Got it. USAID would have stopped it. Got that also.
So, essentially force Canada to take the “virus”. They certainly couldn’t turn back to Paris.
Another example of America showing how “great” it is.
@Connor — Actually, yes. We used to have people on-the-ground monitoring for outbreaks in DRC and elsewhere. Because of the DOGE cuts, we don’t. You don’t have to personally believe this makes a difference, but it does.
@Brent — Millions of people died from the coronavirus pandemic. PPE, vaccines, scientists and doctors, and staying home did help. Be grateful you survived. We should have learned a lot more lessons from that era, but, sadly, some, such as yourself, would rather mock it. If it’s Ebola the next time, we’re all really, really screwed.
@1990
Still bitter you lost.
@Walter Barry — Lost what? I’m still here. Meanwhile, you/he still thinks he won 2020. He didn’t. You’re still fighting the Cold War, WWII, and Civil War, but for the Russians, Germans, and the South. You will lose in-the-end.
Not enough is known about the incident but it didn’t take long for people here to claim it was politically motivated and somehow related to defunding the very crooked USAid. Most of you need to get a life.
@George Nathan Romey — “No politics. We want the jobs the comet will bring.” (Don’t Look Up, 2020)
What happened to the Republicans anti-mask anti-lockdown persona freedom promises??
What a bunch of liars.
Only 34 minutes from landing to takeoff in Montreal (according to Flightview). Not bad.
@Tim
Send pretty smart to me actually.
Lefties in the comments are especially butthurt. Must be because they won’t be able to steal elections via their racial gerrymandering anymore.
@Walter Barry — I wish you were merely trolling.
On your vile manipulation of @Tim’ comment… No, forcing disease onto others is likely a crime against humanity, a war crime, and/or an act of genocide, depending on the context. See the Rome Statute, Geneva Conventions, and Biological Weapons Convention.
On your disingenuous re-framing of voting rights and re-writing of history… No. You have it backwards, yet again. The lower courts found Republican legislatures in the South diluting Black votes (like they have done historically, hence the reason for passing the Voting Rights Act to begin with). Those courts ordered them to draw a fair map, but then the Supreme Court blocked it.
After this era is done, sensible people will look back on that as a deeply unjust decision by a 6-3 conservative Court. Even so, maps often backfire. When national political and economic headwinds shift, these hyper-engineered ‘safe’ districts tend to break, resulting in a dummy-mander that costs them the very seats they tried to lock down. 166 days until Midterms.
So, we take action to protect ourselves and that’s wrong to some simpletons? The problem is NOT enough compassion in the US and we cut off the USAID pipelines of grift, the problem is allowing hemorrhagic viruses to cross from animals to humans by intimate contact across species. There is no acceptable argument to allow those potentially infected into our country. If this bothers some folks, they should take full advantage of going to the Dark Continent and offering their assistance, they have no right to offer ours.
@Gary Leff — Speaking of Air France, there is a fairly big update today in the case against them and Airbus: Paris Appeals Court found both guilty of manslaughter over AF447 in 2009. I’m sure victim’s families wanted even more, but this is step in the right direction for them. (If only we properly held Boeing accountable for the Max crashes…)
@Armadillo of the Air — Really? “the Dark Continent”? C’mon, that’s not even thinly-veiled. *sigh*
News report I read said a passenger from a restricted region was allowed to board by mistake. It said nothing about anyone onboard being infected with Ebola. Hopefully it’s just a false alarm. Still, interesting that the party of Jesus always turns on a dime to the party of NIMBY when it’s time to actually help people.
@Michael — Well, they aren’t the party of actual Jesus… you know, the Love Your Neighbor, Treat Others As You Wish To Be Treated, guy …No, this cult co-opted the Jesus to force a straight white conservative “Christian” nationalism onto the world. Quite different, hypocritical, and knowingly trolling. Akin to a certain ‘party’ in Europe appropriating a Hindu and Buddhist symbol…
@1990
Yep can’t wait till those reps that benefitted from reverse jim crow are ousted.
Heck that vile grifter Steve cohen isn’t even going to run now that he has no way to grift his way into Congress anymore. He cried on TV when his gerrymandered district was rightfully destroyed.
@Walter Barry — You exemplify the bad-faith co-opting and appropriation that I’m talking about.
Calling the protection of Black voting rights “reverse Jim Crow” is a complete inversion of history. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was specifically passed because the white majority in the South spent a century systemically denying Black Americans any representation at all.
Even today, Black Americans make up a massive portion of the Southern electorate (over a quarter in many states). No group is a monolith, and voting patterns shift, but when a white legislative majority specifically carves up a historic district to dilute that community’s voice, it is de facto institutional racism, regardless of whatever “plausible deniability” a court accepts.
What seems clear to me is that this cult under #47 can’t win on policy, merits, or character, so they resort to rigging the map to survive. In effect, they aren’t really winning. They’re just cheating, and that ultimately breaks the system for everyone.
Anyone that thinks an outbreak of Ebola in the Congo is due to USA political machinations lacks an understanding of how the world operates. Especially in a country where 6 million deaths have resulted from tribal warfare since 1996 (source: Global Conflict Tracker). Hardly an environment conducive to battling a dangerous disease, regardless of who occupies the White House (Trump, Clinton, Eisenhower, Grover Cleveland, Warren G Harding, et al). So if a connecting pax is coming from a hot zone, the US authorities have a duty to exercise caution.
@ Walter Barry — You are a disgusting racist pig.
@ 1990. I do fear you may suffer from a fake disease.
To all complaing that gerrymandering causes Ebola or visa-versa, visit Chicago.
@Walter Barry
Could you goon any harder for an unregistered sex offender? You aren’t him, you can’t BE him, and you’ll NEVER get away with the things he has.
Your entire political philosophy is based on a platform of “troll the other side.” What the hell does that accomplish? You’re all dime-a-dozen simpletons that have inexplicably decided to stop thinking for yourselves in order to indulge in some fantasy that reality can’t touch you.