Creepy-Crawly Mealtime Surprise Leaves Passenger “Traumatized”

The sight of a six-legged stowaway allegedly found in a half-finished inflight vegetarian dinner option was hard to swallow for one very unhappy Air India passenger.

Rahul Raghuvanshi says the dead cockroach he discovered near the bottom of his meal tray was not the after-dinner treat he was expecting. Raghuvanshi reportedly made the stomach-turning discovery during an Air India flight from Rajiv Gandhi International Airport (HYD) to Chicago O’Hare International Airport (ORD) this week.

The self-described vegetarian journalist quickly took to social media to share his disgust. He posted a photograph of what appears to be the offending insect lifelessly resting in a partially eaten inflight meal. Raghuvanshi tweeted the message “@airindiain now serves cockroach for vegetarian meals on AI127 #sicktomystomach #traumatized #cockroachinfood,” along with the purported photographic evidence.

Air India officials seemed to acknowledge the incident, later tweeting their own direct response to Raghuvanshi’s post. “We apologize for any inconvenience caused,” the airline said in a Twitter apology, adding, “We have a zero tolerance policy in this respect. Obligatory action is taking place.”

“I ate half of it,” Raghuvanshi recounted to the Daily Mail. “I just couldn’t bring myself to eat anything after I found the roach in my food. I was so nauseous. People around me were extremely grossed out. A guy sitting nearby also threw up after he saw it.”

Raghuvanshi claims even after they provided him with a roach-tainted meal, Air India still managed to continue providing notably icky and cringe-worthy service. The disgusted flyer also took photographs of a long black hair he claims to have found in a sealed blanket he was provided by flight attendants. “It just goes to show how much they care about hygiene,” he told the newspaper.

There are some who might say that, dead roach and poorly washed bedding aside, Rahul Raghuvanshi got off easy. After all, it’s not like he found a live lizard in his inflight meal, which is exactly what passengers say happened on an Air India flight from Delhi International Airport (DEL) to London Heathrow Airport (LHR) last year. In this case, rather than being apologetic, airline officials immediately dismissed the accusation as “false” and “baseless,” despite similar photographic evidence.

[Photo: WIKIMEDIA COMMONS]