One Phone. Two Hours. A Flight Full of Passengers Sent Back to Paris

An Air France flight bound for the Caribbean was forced to turn around mid-air on Friday after a passenger misplaced their phone, delaying the journey for hundreds of travelers.

Flight AF750 had departed Paris Orly Airport at around 12 p.m. en route to Pointe-à-Pitre in Guadeloupe when the crew made the decision to reverse course. The plane had been flying for nearly two hours and had just crossed into the Atlantic before looping back and landing at Orly at 2:37 p.m., according to flight tracking data from FlightAware.

The reason? A missing mobile phone.

According to The Standard, the aircraft turned around after an unsuccessful search for the passenger’s device—though neither Air France nor aviation officials have confirmed the specific circumstances that prompted the unscheduled landing.

After a nearly two-hour delay on the ground, the flight took off again at 4:13 p.m. and ultimately completed the nine-hour trip to Pointe-à-Pitre. The detour likely added several hours to the journey, frustrating passengers and raising eyebrows over aviation priorities.

The airline has yet to release an official statement, and it’s unclear what steps were taken to locate the missing phone—or how passengers responded to the sudden diversion.

The incident comes amid growing scrutiny of electronic devices on flights. Air France’s policy requires mobile phones to be kept in airplane mode during key phases of flight and stipulates safety standards for lithium-ion batteries. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has reported 236 battery-related incidents on aircraft since 2006—with 85 occurring in the past year alone—highlighting the ongoing risks posed by misplaced or malfunctioning devices onboard.

While the missing phone was never found mid-air, its impact grounded a plane, disrupted schedules, and left an entire cabin wondering: could it really have been that serious?

Sources: FlightAware, The Standard, People