Do passenger aircraft ever release their stored human waste while in flight?

star_gazer

Sometimes waste water is accidentally released. Planes don’t jettison sewage mid-flight. In fact, waste is collected in a secure holding tank which no plane crew can dump while in the air. The tank can only be discharged via an exterior valve by the ground crew. But the legend isn’t total garbage. On rare occasions effluent does plunge earthward, usually due to a leak that permits waste (commingled with blue deodorizing fluid) to freeze on the plane’s exterior. Gravity can cause those clumps, dubbed “Blue Ice” by the FAA, to fall. UFOs (Unidentified Flying Ordure) have occurred at least a dozen times in the past two decades, from Lynn, Massachusetts to Chino, California. And just to dispel another myth, those surprise strikes are unlikely to kill anyone. http://travel.aol.com/travel-ideas/articles/airplane-urban-legends-debunked?ncid=AOLCOMMtravdynlprim0663 Nov 06 09, 5:23 PM