As updates come in about the bizarre way a man died in a jet engine, things only get more confusing. Initial reports said that it wasn’t spinning but fresh ones say it was. Either way, he didn’t get sliced and diced. Kyler Efinger just stripped naked and jumped in, before dropping dead.
Engine death mystery
There is no doubt that 30-year-old Kyler Efinger died inside the engine of Delta flight 2348. Everything else is up in the air. Whatever happened at Salt Lake City International Airport on January 1 remains a mystery.
Somehow, Efinger “breached security” stripped naked and climbed up into the intake stream. He wasn’t “sliced and diced” by the turbofans. Clues indicate an overdose.
All the initial reports made a point of emphasizing that the engine wasn’t running when Efinger crawled inside.
A 30-year-old man died after he climbed into a plane engine at Salt Lake City International Airport on Monday night, police and airport officials said. https://t.co/FKVuCi6CnO
— CBS News (@CBSNews) January 3, 2024
Suddenly, the story changed when the victim’s name was revealed. According to police, he was a resident of Park City and a ticketed passenger with a boarding pass to Denver, Colorado.
The bizarre incident began around 9:52 p.m. on January 1, “a store manager inside the airport contacted Airport Control Center dispatchers.” They reported “a disturbance involving a passenger on the secured side of the terminal.”
Authorities aren’t saying much more than that. “The nature of the disturbance remains under investigation.” The “area was secured and passengers were safely deplaned.”
Through emergency exit
According to employees, airport security showed up at the retail outlet looking for the troublemaker and couldn’t find him. They soon “determined he accessed the airport’s outdoor ramp area from the emergency exit.” By 10:06 p.m. they found “personal items, including clothing and shoes, on one of the airport’s runways.”
One minute later, they were informed the man was at one of the airport’s deicing pads. He was still alive and moving fast toward the Delta jet’s engine.
“At 10:08 p.m., dispatchers informed SLCPD officers the man was underneath an aircraft and had accessed the engine. SLCPD officers requested FAA air traffic controllers notify the pilot to shut down the aircraft’s engines.”
A man was found dead inside the engine of an Airbus A220-100 at Salt Lake City International Airport after he breached the airport's emergency exit door. The aircraft belongs to #DeltaAirlines. #avgeeks #Utah #airlines #aviation pic.twitter.com/1juHEJt7Tz
— ????????alsaeed???????? (@alimsaeed604) January 3, 2024
That’s the first mention they might have been running. It’s possible the crew shut them down in time to keep Effinger from being sucked through.
Once they caught up with him, security found Efinger “unconscious partially inside a wing-mounted engine of an occupied Delta Airbus on the deicing pad.”
The local outlet was sure to clarify that “the aircraft’s engines were rotating, police stated – a contradiction from earlier reports from both the Salt Lake City Police Department and the Salt Lake City International Airport that stated the engine was not running when he entered it.” They pulled him out at “10:09 p.m., and lifesaving measures were performed, including CPR and the administration of naloxone.“
