Strange behavior, not terror, on diverted flight

‘Two words’
Flight attendants summoned the captain, who spoke to Mayo. During the conversation, she made reference to there being “six steps to building some unspecified thing.”

“She made reference to being with people associated with two words. She stated that she could not say what the two words were because the last time that she had said the two words she had been kicked off of a flight in the United Arab Emirates,” according to the affidavit.

The captain and purser both believed that she was referring to al-Qaida, Choldin wrote.

About 35 minutes later, when she tried to go to the bathroom, the flight attendants directed her to a different lavatory. Instead, she pulled down her pants and urinated on the floor, Choldin wrote in the affidavit, which was based on his interviews and those of other federal officials.

At that point, the captain ordered her restrained. Two male passengers helped a flight attendant tackle Mayo and restrain her in plastic cuffs.

‘Oh my god’
The flight, with 182 passengers, landed safely at Logan Airport with the escort of two F-15 fighter jets.

Gov. Mitt Romney said later that the woman was claustrophobic and became so upset that she had to be restrained. Passengers said she appeared to have emotional problems.

“She was in a frenzy,” passenger Martin Drinkwater of London told The Boston Globe. “She then pulled her trousers and knickers down and squatted on the floor.”

Antony Nash, 31, of San Diego, said he grew nervous watching the muttering woman seated near him, as she paced and made too many trips to the bathroom. The pilot did not make a general announcement to passengers of what was happening.

“I noticed F-15s next to the plane. I said, ‘Oh my God.’ And then we saw the emergency vehicles,” Nash said.

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