Stowaway in Garuda Flight

Stowaway in Garuda Flight

 
Mario Steve Ambarita, 21, was caught on Tuesday, April 7, as he emerged from a Garuda Indonesia plane that had just landed at the Soekarno-Hatta International airport. What made him suspicious was the fact that he was exiting from the plane’s wheel well, and not through the door like everyone else.

What prompted Mario to do such a reckless thing? He said he simply wanted to see Jakarta, where he was born, and meet his long time idol — the president. He sneaked into a plane and fly 949 kilometers while sitting in the landing gear dock.

Mario admitted that he snuck into the plane before it took off from the Sultan Syarif Kasim II airport in Pekanbaru, Riau, in western Indonesia. And that he stayed in the wheel well during the 105-minute flight.

He arrived alive and well in Jakarta The airport clinic said Mario was fine but perhaps needed to recover from his unusual ordeal.

“We don’t know how he was able to enter the (restricted) area,” Garuda Indonesia’s vice president for corporate communications, Pujobroto, told Kompas.com. “He knew that the plane would stop for a moment before taking off. That was when he entered the plane through the wheel,” Pujobroto said.