by Donald Wood
Last updated: 1:05 PM ET, Mon May 15, 2017
A passenger on a trans-Atlantic flight died last week after the plane was forced to make an emergency landing at Shannon Airport, marking the second death at the Irish airport over the span of just five days.
According to the Irish Mirror, Air Canada Flight AC-849 was flying from London's Heathrow Airport to Toronto Friday when the crew reported a medical emergency and diverted the plane to Shannon.
The flight crew onboard attempted medical assistance for a passenger who fell ill during the flight. When the plane landed at around 5:15 p.m. local time, it was met by airport emergency services, who pronounced the elderly woman dead at the scene.
The county coroner was informed of the incident, and the woman's body was transported to University Hospital Limerick for a postmortem examination. Two hours after the emergency landing, the flight continued to Toronto.
On the same day, a plane made an emergency landing at the facility after a passenger suffered a suspected heart attack.
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While deaths onboard planes are not uncommon, Friday's incident came just five days after an 88-year-old man died on a Delta trans-Atlantic flight that was diverted to Shannon Airport.
Earlier this year, the Irish airport also was the site of another male passenger's death after the Kuwait Airways plane made a scheduled technical stop while en route to New York.
Shannon Airport handled 30 medical emergencies during all of 2016, including two emergency landings in which one of the passengers died onboard during the flight.
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