Dealing with death at 30,000 feet

MedAire advises crews not to place the body in a lavatory. In the past, that has made it difficult to remove the remains from the tiny space after rigor mortis has set in.

While the pilot has the option of diverting the plane after someone has died, often the flight continues on to its destination. If the flight lands in another location, the family of the dead passenger often has to make arrangements to transport the body.

In Desir's case, her body was covered with a blanket and placed on the floor in first class. Other passengers were moved to seats farther away. Friends and family of employees who were flying at a discounted rate were seated closest to the body, Smith said. The plane continued on to New York, even though it could have put down in Miami.

Decades ago, in the early days of commercial flight, all stewardesses were nurses. Now, the FAA mandates that flight attendants receive non-professional-level training in such methods as CPR, but they are not required to be able to use the syringes and intravenous drips in onboard medical kits.

Northwest said that doctors, nurses or paramedics are aboard an estimated 96 percent of its flights. MedAire said medical professionals stepped forward to help in 48 percent of the more than 17,000 medical situations it was called on to help with last year.

In Desir's case, a cousin who was with her claimed that she was initially refused access to oxygen tanks and that they weren't working. American Airlines said that she was helped swiftly and that the equipment worked.

Nevertheless, the oxygen tanks that the FAA requires aboard planes are not designed primarily for such medical emergencies. Instead, the tanks are meant to help people in case of sudden cabin decompression, according to the FAA. Oxygen at a hospital may be more concentrated and can be given directly through a nose tube.

Desir's husband and two children, ages 23 and 10, have hired a law firm to investigate the death of the Brooklyn nurse.

"My wife died on the plane," her husband, Mario Fontus, told The Associated Press. "And I want to know what happened on that plane."

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