Ebola Scare Quarantines Passengers, Crew On 777

More than 260 passengers and crew were quarantined on a United Airlines Boeing 777 at Liberty International Airport Saturday after a passenger traveling from Liberia threw up during a flight from Brussels. He and his daughter were taken off the plane by HAZMAT-suited officials from the Center for Disease Control to be tested for Ebola, which neither had. As the passenger was evaluated at a nearby hospital, the remaining 253 passengers and 14 crew stayed inside the aluminum tube, no doubt contemplating a potentially uncomfortable future. They were released after about two hours.

The sick passenger vomited during the flight and that's an early sign of Ebola, along with a high temperature and body aches. After being hauled off the plane by the white-suited CDC officials, the passenger was apparently quickly diagnosed to have something other than Ebola. "After an examination by physicians at University Hospital, the symptoms of one individual were found to be consistent with another, minor treatable condition unrelated to Ebola," said Donna Leusner, a spokeswoman for the New Jersey Department of Health, in a statement. "The second individual, who was traveling with the patient, was asymptomatic." Both were released from the hospital about the same time the passengers headed to customs.