‘Galaxy Note 7’ WiFi Hotspot Prank Delays Virgin America Flight Bound For Boston

Someone pulled a prank during a Virgin America flight to Boston using the Samsung Galaxy Note 7. Although not physically present in the flight, the discontinued handset’s name was enough to cause a scare among the passengers and crew of the plane. Thus, the supposed to be harmless prank caused the delay of the flight and the cancellation of the succeeding flight.

According to The Verge, a passenger named his portable WiFi hotspot into “Galaxy Note 7_1097.” When other passengers and the crew detected the hotspot name, they quickly jumped into the conclusion that the banned handset made it to the flight. As a result, the captain and the crew made urgent announcements demanding the owner to speak up.

At one point, the captain announced that he is diverting the flight to Wyoming instead of landing in Boston as scheduled. The pilot made it clear that the emergency landing was needed if no one surrendered the device.

Another passenger, Lucas Wojciechowski, took to Twitter to reveal what was taking place during the flight. In one of his tweets, he quoted the pilot to have sad, “This isn’t a joke. We’re going to turn on the lights (it’s 11pm) and search everyone’s bag until we find it.”

Fortunately, someone confessed to have done the did, revealing that they changed the name of their SSID wireless device to “Samsung Galaxy Note 7_1097.” The flight crew immediately announced to everyone that there wasn’t really a Note 7 onboard, as per the BBC.

Not only did the prank cause the Boston-bound flight to get delayed, it also affected the 9 a.m. flight at the airport. The latter was reportedly canceled, and many passengers had to wait for two hours.

In October, the Federal Aviation Administration and the Department of Transportation’s Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration announced that the Galaxy Note 7 was henceforth banned from U.S. airline flights after it was proven to be a fire hazard. The order came days after Samsung revealed that it is scrapping its flagship phablet for good.