A flight left Denver’s airport this weekend, the toilet erupted, and it had to turn around
Jun 2, 2026, 12:51 PM
If you thought your Monday was going bad… It could always be worse, like it was for the poor folks on a Turkish Airlines flight at of Denver International Airport on Saturday (May 30).
Farhang Bharucha was settled into seat 9C on that flight to Istanbul, probably thinking about Turkish coffee, the Bosphorus, maybe a nice kebab. Instead, he got a front-row seat to something no one puts on their travel bucket list: urine and feces erupting from the plane’s toilet.
The Denver-to-Istanbul flight — DIA’s longest route at 6,130 miles — had barely gotten off the ground Saturday when one of the lavatories started leaking sewage into the cabin, according to the Denver Post. Not a drip. Not a trickle. A full-on eruption of the stuff nightmares and Yelp reviews are made of. The plane turned back to Denver International Airport, and the flight was ultimately cancelled.
So instead of 13 hours over the Atlantic, passengers got 13 hours of wondering what exactly went wrong in row whatever-was-closest-to-that-bathroom. Bharucha told the Denver Post the airline knew about a leak before takeoff but didn’t tell passengers — a claim that tracks with an Instagram video he posted calling the experience “a nightmare.” He said he’s lost all trust in the airline and hopes his family can rebook for Tuesday. Turkish Airlines did not respond to the Denver Post’s request for comment, which, honestly, what do you even say? “We apologize for the inconvenience and the biohazard”?
For what it’s worth, this kind of thing is having a moment in aviation. Earlier this year, a JetBlue flight in Philadelphia was grounded for hours after crew refused to remove feces from a clogged toilet — and at least two passengers volunteered to clean it themselves if it meant the plane could take off. A Philippine Airlines 777 suffered a complete toilet failure over the Pacific, forcing flight attendants to manually scoop waste mid-flight for 15 hours. So, sure, Denver’s entry into the airborne sewage hall of fame is bad. But at least the plane turned around.
The Denver-Istanbul route launched in June 2024 and was celebrated as a milestone for DIA’s global connectivity, generating an estimated $54 million in annual economic impact. It remains a popular route. Just maybe pack some nose plugs.
