Passengers have to put up with a lot on flights, from people putting their bare feet on the arm rest to others kicking the seat in front of them – but perhaps this woman’s experience tops them all.
Angelina Nicolle, a nutrition coach from the US, has told the story of the moment a man sitting next to her on a flight had his full sick bag tear, with his vomit “gushing out” all over her.
Angelina was travelling from Bangkok to London when the horror unfolded. In a now-viral TikTok, she explained that she was sitting in an aisle seat, the man was in the middle seat and his girlfriend was in the window seat.
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“Everything was going fine, the plane was beginning to just take off, everyone was getting their seatbelts on, you’re minding your own business reading a book,” Angelina said.
[But] as the plane takes off you notice the man takes out his paper doggy bag and throws up into it.
“And as disgusting as it is, you don’t want to embarrass him. I guess it happens – he’s throwing up in the doggy bag and not on you.”
Angelina said a couple of seconds later – he threw up again in the sick bag.
“You’re looking straight ahead acting like it’s not happening two inches away from you.
“He throws up another time and the girlfriend finally leans over and taps your shoulder and is like, ‘Hey, can we have your paper doggy bag? We need another one.’
“I frantically start looking in my seat like, ‘Yes, of course,’ and I can’t find one. I’m freaking out because the guy next to me throws up again, it’s continuing.
“Finally this girl from the aisle across from me notices what’s happening and quickly hands me her doggy bag.”
Angelina then turned to give the man the sick bag, and that was when she realised that his bag was full to the brim with vomit and could explode at any time.
“If he throws up another time it will literally overflow, and at this point, I’m holding the paper bag so that they can put the other paper bag in this paper bag because the bottom of the paper bag is so full of throw up that it’s starting to break.”
Angelina and the man’s girlfriend then proceeded to hold the ends of the paper bag so the man could put the other bag inside it.
But that was when Angelina’s nightmare became all too real.
“The bottom of the bag filled to the brim with his vomit breaks open,” she said. “And his vomit gushes out of the bottom all over onto his lap and, unfortunately, all over me and all over my stuff that’s under the seat.”
As the plane was still taking off, no one could get up from their seats, so Angelina had to sit in the man’s vomit for the next 10 minutes.
“So you have to sit there for the next 10 minutes with some other person’s throw up.”
“Has that ever happened to you?” she asked her 61,500 followers with a smirk on her face.
Angelina’s clip has since gone viral attracting 1.3 million views and thousands of comments.
TikTok users were left stunned by her story, describing it as the “most traumatic experience” that could happen on a flight.
“Not even the air marshal could contain me. My emetophobia [fear of vomiting] could never,” one person wrote.
“I would have got up as soon as he started. I wouldn’t have been able to sit there,” said another, while a third added: “Nah. I would have fainted so they could call a medical emergency.”
One woman said she “gagged” when Angelina said the words, “filled to the brim”.
“I thought of how warm it would be. My eyes are watering – help, help,” she said.
Meanwhile, a flight attendant said in “emergency situations” like this it is OK to ring the call button multiple times.
“If you ring your call light two or three times we’ll know something’s going on. You can’t get up but we can, and can bring stuff to clean up,” another flight attendant added.