‘I just threw up in my mouth’: Woman boards United flight, then looks down and immediately regrets checking that spot

Air travel comes with cramped seats and stale air, but one woman’s recent find on a United Airlines flight shows that cleanliness is still a big problem. Kat Shortsleeve was on a five-hour United flight to or from New York when she spotted something disgusting stuck deep in her seat’s crack.

The discovery ruined her entire flight. Shortsleeve filmed the spot, showing what looks like dark green mystery gunk hiding where you never want to put your fingers. She was clearly disgusted by what she saw, and shared the experience on TikTok.

According to Bro Bible, the content creator called out the airline right away in her video’s text. She asked, “Shouldn’t there be protocols for United to clean their planes?” The video has gotten over 583,000 views. Shortsleeve captioned it, “Going to be a long 5 hours.”

Airlines clearly aren’t prioritizing basic sanitation standards

Viewers were just as grossed out as she was. The comments were filled with people sharing their disgust. “Flights are getting more expensive and the planes are getting filthier and smaller,” one person commented. “This is why I always get seat covers,” another said.

One commenter summed it up perfectly: “I just threw up inside of my mouth.”

Many viewers agreed that you can’t trust airlines to keep things clean, even after stricter hygiene rules were put in place during the pandemic. That’s why many people now bring their own cleaning supplies. This isn’t the only concerning truth about airplane conditions that travelers have recently discovered.

Most airlines do a quick cleaning after every flight. This usually means wiping surfaces and picking up trash. Deep cleaning only happens when the plane isn’t being used, and how often depends on the airline.

This makes Shortsleeve’s find extra annoying since United Airlines has made big claims about their hygiene. Their website says their basic protocols include cleaning before boarding and giving out sanitary wipes to passengers. They added a bigger cleaning system in 2020. They claim they use robots that clean cabins weekly, spraying an antimicrobial liquid called Zoono Microbe Shield.

If United uses robots to spray antimicrobial liquid every week, how did dark green gunk get missed in an easy-to-see crack? It looks like the robots aren’t catching everything. Flight attendants have also shared passenger habits that make their jobs harder, suggesting that maintaining cleanliness is a challenge from multiple angles. No matter how much technology is used, you might still need to bring your own wipes for peace of mind on your next flight.