That’s not someone’s feet you’re smelling while on a quick weekend flight. It could very well be a…turkey?
A picture of a turkey sitting in a seat onboard what looks to be a Delta flight has gone viral after Twitter user Moesha Mitchel posted it online, reports the Telegraph. It’s believed to be an emotional support animal, which the National Service Animal Registry says is “a pet that has been prescribed by a person’s licenced therapist, psychologist or psychiatrist…to bring comfort and minimize the negative symptoms of the person’s emotional/psychological disability.”
You get on the plane and sit next to someone with this as their emotional support animal, what do you do? ? pic.twitter.com/rYKgaIqdOY
— Moesha (@moeshamitchel) January 6, 2016
The assumed same turkey was snapped in an Instagram post a few days earlier, sitting comfortably in a wheelchair at baggage claim in an airport terminal.
An emotional support turkey!! Serious!! @Delta @DeltaNewsHub @sltrib @DeseretNews @saltlakechamber @DeltaVacations pic.twitter.com/md4r3I8YUU
— Alan W. Mortensen (@_amort) December 29, 2015
According to Delta’s website, the airline allows passengers to travel with emotional support animals as long as they’re “trained to behave properly in public settings.” These animals also “travel free of charge … and are exempt from cabin allotment.” And like service animals, emotional support animals can be transported in the cabin.
However, Delta also lists the animals that aren’t accepted onboard due to safety and/or public health concerns, and these include “hedgehogs, ferrets, reptiles…and non-household birds, including farm poultry.”
So either Delta staff made an exception for this one particular turkey, or it managed to sneak onboard unnoticed. Either way, it makes for one hilarious picture.
