While air travel remains the safest mode of transportation by a significant margin, there might be something happening on airplanes that could cause you a literal headache. Toxic fumes from jet airliners can sometimes leak into the cabin and cause significant health problems for passengers, according to a new investigation from The Wall Street Journal. The fumes have reportedly been found in the cabin of almost every modern airplane model, and there are indications that both the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and airplane manufacturers have long known about the problem.
How do toxic fumes get on airplanes?
There have been thousands of “fume events reported to the Federal Aviation Administration since 2010, in which toxic fumes from a jet’s engines leak unfiltered into the cockpit or cabin,” said the Journal’s investigation. This is due to a design element on planes called “bleed air.” While half of the oxygen on planes is recirculated into the cabin through filters, the other half is “pulled from outside via the aircraft’s engines,” which can bring unwanted oil fumes into the cabin if the seals keeping the oil out fail.
These fumes “have led to emergency landings, sickened passengers and affected pilots’ vision and reaction times midflight,” said the Journal. The majority of these fumes “consist of carbon monoxide and unspecified quantities of neurotoxins, aren’t toxic and have mild to no symptoms,” said The Hill. Continued exposure, however, such as what is experienced by pilots and flight attendants, could “lead to more severe side effects.”
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The bleed air design has been “featured in almost every modern commercial jetliner except Boeing’s 787,” said the Journal. But the fume reports are “largely driven by Airbus A320s, which are used by the three largest U.S. airlines,” said NewsNation. A 2015 FAA report said the annual rate of fume incidents was about 33 per 1 million aircraft flights; the Journal reported this rate was significantly higher in 2024 at 108 incidents per 1 million flights.
What can these fumes cause?
While the fumes don’t often cause major problems, they sometimes lead to significant health consequences. Flight attendant Florence Chesson was diagnosed with a traumatic brain injury and “permanent damage to her peripheral nervous system” from fume exposure, said the Journal. The effects on her brain were “akin to a chemical concussion and ‘extraordinarily similar’ to those of a National Football League linebacker after a brutal hit,” Chesson’s doctor told the Journal.
“The most common problems I see are general nervous system problems,” Dr. Robert Harrison, an occupational medicine specialist at the University of California San Francisco, told CBS News. If a person breathes the tainted air into their lungs, it “circulates around, and then it gets into their brain and can affect the other parts of the nervous system.”
What have officials said?
The FAA maintains that fumes rarely leak into airplane cabins. In “rare instances, mechanical issues such as failures of an engine oil seal or recirculation fan bearings can cause fumes to enter the cabin,” the agency told CBS News in a statement. The FAA “investigates the causes and makes sure they're fixed before the aircraft returns to service.”
Flight manufacturers and airlines have provided similar remarks. Airbus’ aircraft are “designed and manufactured according to all relevant and applicable airworthiness requirements,” an Airbus spokesperson said to People. Airbus is “committed to continuously enhancing our products, working closely with operators and regulators to ensure the best possible cabin environment for passengers and crew.”
