Passenger's Note7 Wi-Fi prank causes an onboard freakout

Nobody wants to deal with the Samsung Galaxy Note 7. Nobody.
 By 
Marissa Wenzke
 on 
Passenger's Note7 Wi-Fi prank causes an onboard freakout
A Virgin America flight was almost diverted after suspicions arose there was a Samsung Galaxy Note 7 onboard. Credit: neilson barnard/ Getty Images

Note to all Samsung Galaxy Note7 users (because yes, apparently there are still some of you out there): Nobody wants your explosion-prone phones on the plane.

On Tuesday, that stance was again made clear by a dramatic Virgin Airlines flight drama that almost turned into a full-blown 3 a.m. diversion.

The story was told by the tweets of passenger Lucas Wojciechowski, a software engineer according to his Twitter bio.


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He was flying on Virgin America Flight 358 from San Francisco to Boston, when a Wi-Fi network called "Samsung Galaxy Note7_1097" was first spotted, according to BBC News.

The captain reportedly made threats to search the entire plane and just divert the flight completely unless the offending device was found.

However, after all was said and done in this particular plane saga, it turns out things weren't so dramatic. There actually wasn't a Samsung Galaxy Note 7 aboard the plane. Someone just thought it'd be a good idea to name their Wi-Fi that and, you know, just stir the pot a bit. Still, subsequent flights were reportedly delayed nonetheless.

The U.S. Department of Transportation called for an emergency ban on Samsung Galaxy Note 7s on all U.S. planes in October -- a restriction also supported by the Federal Aviation Administration and the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.

Mashable has reached out to Virgin America for more information about this specific incident.

There's been a lot of plane drama lately, from someone reportedly yelling at Ivanka Trump aboard a JetBlue flight Thursday to the forced removal of YouTuber Adam Salah from a Delta flight Wednesday, in a situation he called discriminatory. Saleh said he was targeted for speaking Arabic, while Delta insisted that he and his friend were "disruptive" and showing "provocative behavior."

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Marissa Wenzke

Marissa is a real-time news intern at the LA office. She has a bachelor's degree in political science from UC Santa Barbara and a master's degree in journalism from Columbia University. She's a free spirit.

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