Flight aborted after attack of feline terror
BRUSSELS A cat that escaped from its cage during a Belgian commercial flight this week managed to get into the plane's cockpit, where it scratched a co-pilot, forcing the crew to turn back and make an unscheduled landing.
The flight, from Brussels to Vienna, had been in the air about 20 minutes on Monday when "it was noticed" that a passenger's pet, a gray cat named Gin, had escaped from its cage, "although it is not yet clear how," the airline, SN Brussels Airlines, said in a statement on Tuesday.
Gin, a prized animal that travels to cat shows around the world, started wandering around the passenger cabin while its owner slept, an airline spokesman said.
The cat slipped through the cockpit door as a flight attendant served lunch to the pilots.
The scared animal was "very aggressive and scratched the co-pilot," the spokesman said.
The pilot decided to return to Brussels as a precaution, and the passengers departed later on another flight.
Geert Sciot, the airline's vice president for communications, told BBC News Online that the airline fully supported the captain's decision to turn back. Nobody, he told the BBC, could tell what an agitated cat might do scrabbling around amid the sensitive equipment in the cockpit.
The cat had been checked in Oslo in an internationally approved carrier, but the airline said it may change its procedures for pets. (AP, Reuters)
http://www.iht.com/articles/533390.html
This does not beat the story about the cat who was returned to his owner after 18 years ;)