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SALT LAKE CITY — A flight on its way to Portland turned around and landed shortly after taking off from Salt Lake City International Airport on Sunday.
Two passengers on board told KSL-TV that shortly after takeoff, they started hearing strange noises coming from what they thought was the engine and said they felt the plane dipping.
"We kind of felt like the plane, like the engine almost sounded like it shut off, like it just went quiet," said passenger Jaclyn Blain. "The plane dropped in altitude, and then the engine seemed to go back on, and then we went up in altitude."
Blain said their ears started popping and she noticed the plane circling above the Great Salt Lake.
"We were all kind of like putting our fingers in our ears and holding our noses and trying to, like, blow our ears out," she said. "We were looking around and we're like, 'Wow, everybody's doing this. It's not just affecting one or two people."
Felt like being stabbed
KSL-TV spoke with one of Blain's colleagues on the phone who said it felt like someone had stabbed her inside her ear.
"There was a baby in first class, poor little thing was just screaming his poor head off," Blain said.
Delta Air Lines said the aircraft was unable to pressurize above 10,000 feet.
Blain said passengers weren't told what was going on.
"The flight attendants said, 'Hey, we're going to go back to Salt Lake, captain's discretion,' no really, explanation, no nothing. And then a few minutes more went by, and then the captain came on and said, 'OK, we're going to go back to Salt Lake, we're having trouble stabilizing the pressure in the cabin."
The airline also issued the following statement about the flight:
"Delta flight 1203 from SLC to PDX experienced a pressurization issue in-flight that resulted in an air return to SLC. Customers have been accommodated on another aircraft. We sincerely apologize to our customers for the inconvenience and delay of their travels. The safety of our customers and people remains Delta's most important priority."
The airline also said oxygen masks did not deploy. The flight had 140 passengers on board.
"My colleague, she had blood coming out of her ears," Blain said. "It ended up being she had a ruptured eardrum. One of my other colleagues ended up having one ruptured eardrum, and then another one of my colleagues had a bloody nose and a bloody eardrum."
First responders met flight
A representative from the airline said some passengers were met by paramedics after landing in Salt Lake City, and referred all questions to local first responders.
Blain estimates that 11 to 15 people were taken to the hospital for related injuries.
Her colleague told KSL-TV she was given antibiotics and instruction to follow up with an ear nose and throat doctor while her burst eardrum heals.
"I do think that obviously something went wrong this morning, and a checkpoint got missed or something happened," Blain said. "I do think that they could have communicated with us on the plane better to not leave a whole bunch of people wondering what was going on and why we were making all these strange movements and sounds and on, off, up, down, up, down, on, off, all over the place. Kind of just let us know, 'Hey, don't panic, we're taking care of this.'"
