2,186 gassy goats blamed for flight diversion

"Two Thousand Goats, A Plane and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day" would make an excellent children's book if it hadn't been the true story of one Singapore Airlines cargo plane.

The flight was on its way from Adelaide, Australia to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia when the pilots received an alert that the smoke alarms in the cargo hold had been activated. The plane made an emergency landing in Bali, and after the aircraft was inspected, no fire or smoke was discovered. But there were 2,186 goats traveling on that flight…2,186 very flatulent goats.

According to Aviation Herald, the gas produced by those aromatic farm animals was enough to trigger the smoke alarms on the Boeing 747 freighter plane. But, as unpleasant as that sounds (and smells), the flight was able to take off after almost three hours on the ground in Bali, later landing in Kuala Lumpur without any other gas-or-goat related incident.

Although a Singapore Airlines spokesperson confirmed to TODAYOnline that Flight 7108 was carrying a shipment of goats, it declined to validate the claim that the goats' descending colons had anything to do with the flight diversion. "That is an assumption being made by media, which we are unable to confirm," the spokesperson said, probably right after he started slamming his own head in his desk drawers.

Goats are in a class of mammals called ruminants, which also includes cows, deer, giraffes and sheep. Most of them have four compartments in their stomachs, and digesting food is a multi-step process that involves regurgitating whatever they've eaten before swallowing it again. Their stomachs can contain hundreds of microbes that aid in the digestion process, but — as a side effect — produce methane gas. That methane gas is then, um, expelled, which can have a significant effect on the environment. According to The Telegraph, ruminants are responsible for 2% of the methane produced in the United States, 25% of the methane produced in Great Britain and a jaw-dropping 90% of the methane emissions in New Zealand.

False fire alarm or not, the cargo hold was probably a terribly unpleasant place to be. And to unload.

This article was originally posted at Road Warrior Voices.