by Donald Wood
Last updated: 10:30 AM ET, Fri January 13, 2017
On Thursday, two flight attendants working an Alaska Airlines flight became sick after they were exposed to the residue left over from a deicing agent used on the plane.
According to The Mercury News, the Alaska Airlines Flight 322 was en route from Seattle to San Jose, California, when two crew members sitting in the front of the plane noticed a powdery substance coming out of the air vents.
The flight departed Seattle at 4:48 p.m. local time and landed safely in San Jose at 6:54 p.m. local time. As the plane was beginning its descent, the attendants who noticed the substance began to fall ill.
Alaska Airlines spokeswoman Ann Zaninovich said in a statement that one of the attendants had to be taken to a local hospital, and the other was treated and released. Of the 181 passengers and six crew members onboard at the time, only the two flight attendants were impacted by the powder.
Officials from the San Jose Fire Department are currently investigating the incident, but Zaninovich said all signs point to the substance coming out of the vents deicing agent residue, which is nontoxic.
"At this point, we still don't know exactly what the material is," San Jose Fire Department Capt. Mitch Matlow said in a statement. "We're getting conflicting reports and because of that we're not prepared to say it was one thing or another. But we are working to identify it."
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