“I didn’t think it was that big of a deal,” the rapper, who now stars in DIY Network’s home renovation showtheVanilla Ice Project,toldThe Blastof his experience. “During the flight there was a situation, they told us we would be in the middle of the runway after a 15-hour flight. They said there are some passengers that are ill so we are going to go out on the runway and hang out,” he said.
“They sealed off the two floors and eventually removed first class at a separate entrance.”
He told the outlet he is very tired following the long-haul flight, but feeling fine, though he missed his connecting flight to his home in Florida because of the delay on the tarmac.
He first tweeted about his experience aboard the flight, which arrived at New York’s JFK airport from Dubai Wednesday morning.
“So I just landed from Dubai and now there is like tons of ambulances and fire trucks and police all over the place,”he wrote on Twitter. Adding, “This is crazy. Apparently there is over 100 people sick on the bottom floor, so happy I’m up top, it’s a double decker plane 380.”
“About 10 passengers on board flight EK203 from Dubai to New York were taken ill,” a representative for Emirates told PEOPLE in a statement Wednesday morning.
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A representative for the CDC told PEOPLE Wednesday afternoon that it had been alerted early that morning that a flight had landed at JFK with “passengers, including crew members, complaining of illness including cough, fever, and symptoms of gastrointestinal illness. CDC public health officers . . . completed health evaluations (including taking temperatures) of all 549 passengers and crew members on board.”
The spokesperson noted that “11 individuals have been taken to a local hospital for care,” one more than Emirates reported, “and the remaining passengers have been released.”
source: people.com
