14 DAY TRIAL // A US Airways Express flight has been delayed yesterday because the plane was under attack by a swarm of bees.
Flight 2690 from Charlotte to Indianapolis was pushed back about three hours until the airport could bring in a beekeeper and eliminate the threat.
The swarm of bees at Charlotte Douglas International Airport was witnessed by passengers stuck on the plane.
"We all board - no big deal - and the pilot comes on the speaker and says 'Ladies and Gentlemen, this is different but we have a swarm of bees that have landed on the tug - which is the part that pushes the plane out.'
"So of course everyone opens up the blinds and there were several bees swarming around and some of the people that could really see it said there were thousands of them," passenger Andy Jeffers describes.
According to WFSB, the aircraft was scheduled for takeoff at 1:15 p.m. on Wednesday. The bees took over the area surrounding gate E-11.
Some travelers have described a numerous number of bees around the plane.
"The pilot comes on and kinda sheepishly tells us the tug truck they use to push the plane back has bees swarming all over. [...] Looking out the window, there was just a million bugs. I don't know how to describe it," another passenger reports.
The bee keeper found a hive on the tug and relocated the insects by building a second hive, a few feet away from the runway.
"All of a sudden the bee keeper shows up in his truck and he gets out and sure enough he knows what he's doing. [...] I guess he got the queen bee away from the tug and all of the bees swarmed over off the tug and they pushed us away," Jeffers recalls.