Apparently eating passports is a thing on flights.

[hardcorestitch]

A Ryanair flight was diverted to a French airport after several passengers ate passports or flushed passports in the lavatory. Weirdest and most disgusting diversion ever.

https://nypost.com/2025/09/29/lifes...trange-passengers-try-to-eat-flush-passports/

 

[LuvOrlando]

How on earth does this benefit a person? Were they hoping to lose ID in order to create a new identity or something when they got to the destination? Was there identity theft and they bribed someone to get waved on but knew they's get discovered when they landed? There has got to be a reason that made sense to them in that moment

 

[snappy]

Hopefully the French authorities will get to the bottom of it. I would have been freaked out if I had been on that flight.

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

Maybe there are benefits in Europe by saying you're "undocumented".

We just returned Sunday from a 13-nt trip visiting England, Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland and France. We had conversations with many private tour guides and a taxi driver who had a LOT to say about their country's immigration policy. Let's just say they were not happy about it.

 

[china mom]

I am missing something in tis story. How did they know the second passenger was trying to flush his passport if the bathroom door was closed? And we know it was closed because the FA was "banging on the door"

 

[bcla]

I am missing something in tis story. How did they know the second passenger was trying to flush his passport if the bathroom door was closed? And we know it was closed because the FA was "banging on the door"

They might not have know if at the time, but I'd think they would know after they managed to get the lav door open and looked at what was in the toilet.

Here's video of one of the guys being arrested in France. Sounds very much English, as this was scheduled as a flight to London.

https://viewfromthewing.com/plane-diverts-to-paris-after-passengers-eat-and-flush-their-passports/

 

[NotUrsula]

How on earth does this benefit a person? Were they hoping to lose ID in order to create a new identity or something when they got to the destination? Was there identity theft and they bribed someone to get waved on but knew they's get discovered when they landed? There has got to be a reason that made sense to them in that moment

It's the most physically comfortable way to seek asylum; you need a passport to board an international flight, but then when you arrive without a passport, you can claim asylum-seeker status and the authorities of the country where you landed have no normal way to deport you back to your home country, because you won't be re-admitted without a passport. Either you stay in that airport's international arrivals area forever, stateless, or they let you apply for asylum.

Sometimes the passports are fake, provided by traffickers, who advise the people traveling that they should do this before arrival. I think it turned into a frenzy in this case because the flight arrival time was suddenly moved up because the flight was diverted, so they had a lot less time to dispose of the passports. (Presumably they did not know that when an international flight is diverted to a country other than the original destination, passengers do not usually process through immigration or customs; they are normally held on the plane to wait for weather to clear, or placed in an airside holding area to wait for a replacement aircraft, and sent back on their way. This is because of visa requirements to actually enter the second country. If for some reason they have to stay overnight, the airline usually arranges with Immigration to issue a special temporary transit-entry permit, and they take them by bus to a designated hotel. Skip out from there and you're a fugitive.)

 

[Brian rhymes with dyin]

Maybe there are benefits in Europe by saying you're "undocumented".

We just returned Sunday from a 13-nt trip visiting England, Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland and France. We had conversations with many private tour guides and a taxi driver who had a LOT to say about their country's immigration policy. Let's just say they were not happy about it.

 

[hardcorestitch]

Maybe there are benefits in Europe by saying you're "undocumented".

We just returned Sunday from a 13-nt trip visiting England, Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland and France. We had conversations with many private tour guides and a taxi driver who had a LOT to say about their country's immigration policy. Let's just say they were not happy about it.

That… along with the terrible and draconian, inhumane handling of people heading home in the US from international visits is why I will NOT do any non-essential international travel until 2029.