The FBI and Hawaiian Airlines are both calling it “a miracle” that a teenage boy hopped a jet in San Jose, California and survived a 5 1/2-hour flight to Hawaii in the plane’s wheel well.
According to the Los Angeles Times, surveillance video from San Jose’s Mineta International Airport showed the 16-year-old hopping a fence before climbing into the wheel well of the aircraft.
Authorities have said that the teen, who was in the wheel well of Hawaii Airlines flight 45, survived freezing temperatures at an altitude of 38,000 feet over the Pacific Ocean.
“How he survived I don’t know,” said Tom Simon, an FBI spokesman in Honolulu. “It’s a miracle.”
Someone finally notice the boy on the tarmac at Maui's Kahului Airport after the flight landed.
Reuters reported that he told officials that he had run away from home. He was then turned over to child protective services.
It is not clear exactly how the teen was able to breach security in San Jose. An investigation into the incident is underway.