MARTA GONZÁLEZ-HONTORIA
Saturday, October 31, 2020 - 01:44
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Of all the ways to come into the world, doing it at 10,000 meters is undoubtedly one of the most unusual and dramatic.
They are always news.
This was the case on October 8, when on a three-hour flight between New Delhi and Bangalore a woman gave birth to a boy, Bakshi, with the help of the IndiGo crew and Dr. Shailaja Vallabhani, coincidentally on board.
When the event emerged, Shona Owen greeted him, as always, with emotion.
Despite living in London, thousands of miles away, there is something that ties him closely to Bakshi.
She too, 30 years ago, was born among hostesses, aboard a British Airways flight from Ghana.
Owen came into the world 30 minutes from Gatwick airport.
The story of that unusual flight on November 2, 1990, is told by her mother, Debbie, who was traveling alone with her first daughter, 4 years old.
"I felt that something was not right after stopping over in Abidjan (Ivory Coast), so I went to the bathroom of the plane and saw that it was bleeding. I pressed the emergency button, something I had always wanted to do, and the flight attendant came [...]. There were no midwives among the crew. They took me to first class and the commander left. The fact that we met over Algeria made me decide that the best thing was to hold on to Europe. "
Debbie with Shona in her arms within minutes of birth.
As fate would have it, on that flight too, a Ganhé doctor, Dr. Bakker, who was traveling as a passenger, assisted Debbie's delivery.
"Ladies and gentlemen, we have crossed the English Channel and a new passenger has come on board," explained the captain over the aircraft's public address system to applause from the cabin.
That premature baby who landed wrapped in British Airways blankets has told his story hundreds of times.
Although it was not always like that.
"She was very shy," Shona Owen says by email from her home near the Thames.
The fascination his story aroused, however, gave him the confidence not only to tell it, but to dedicate himself at the university to investigate more cases like his.
"The first baby to be born on a plane was in 1929. There have been at least 76 other cases," says Shona, although she cautions that there is no reliable database.
"There could be twice as many, but those are the ones I documented in my project."
The young woman wanted to create a community of people like her to achieve, for example, that there is a common terminology in official documents.
"My parents are Scottish and I was born in British airspace, so I am British."
His old passport included the observation: "The holder was born on a plane ten miles south of Mayfiled, Sussex."
The one she currently has wrongly indicates: "Born in the sea."
"I have to renew my passport shortly and I hope I can correct it. I was born on the ground, but in the air, and I know passports that use the 'Born on a plane'."
What is the probability of being born in the clouds?
Shona with her old passport, which indicates that she was born in the air.
"From my research I found that there is an average of four airborne births per year, at least since 2006. But in 2020 we have already had five. The year with the most cases was 2017, with six babies."
Shona contacted all airlines and press offices, civil aviation authorities and other medical companies to see if there was a registry of births on airplanes.
"I found, for example, that Lufthansa had added 11 births on board since 1965, but there weren't many more references, so I decided to create my own database."
As a result, many pilots and other
skyborns
(born on airplanes) have come into contact with her over the years.
"I was even contacted by one of the hostesses who had been present at my delivery!"
And what's the truth in that rumor that babies born in airplanes fly free for the rest of their lives?
"Not everything is a myth. There are airlines that believe that it is good luck to have a child born on their planes and give them flights for life. British Airways gave me two round trips for two people when I turned 18 I took my sister to Australia. That first-class ticket to Sydney was almost as good a story as my coming into the world, "Shona jokes.
What is evident, at least in this case, is that the shocking beginning of his biography has marked his destiny.
The young British woman works for an international luxury travel company.
"Sometimes I feel like I was really born to travel."
According to the criteria of The Trust Project
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