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Virgin Australia apologizes for asking passengers to urinate in bottles and sinks after toilets failed on board a flight to Brisbane

Passengers on a Virgin Australia flight were forced to relieve themselves in bottles after all the lavatories stopped functioning.
posted by Aaratrika Bal
Tuesday 9/2/2025 at 9:10AM EDT
  • SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA - JUNE 24: Virgin Australia Boeing 737 aircraft at Sydney Airport on June 24, 2025 in Sydney, Australia. Virgin Australia is the country's second largest airline group, focused on delivering great value and choice to approximately 20 million passengers annually. Revitalised under the ownership of Bain Capital, Virgin Australia is a value carrier which operates a fleet of more than 100 aircraft on 76 routes to 38 destinations across its domestic and short-haul international airline business. The airline has a world class suite of international airline partners which enable its customers to fly to over 650 destinations globally, and last week commenced its own long-haul international services between Australia and Doha through a wet lease with Qatar Airways. Virgin Australia's airline business is supported by the award-winning loyalty program Velocity, which has approximately 80 commercial partners and approximately 13 million members, making it one of the largest loyalty programs in the country. (Photo by James D. Morgan/Getty Images for Virgin Australia )
    SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA - JUNE 24: Virgin Australia Boeing 737 aircraft at Sydney Airport on June 24, 2025 in Sydney, Australia. Virgin Australia is the country's second largest airline group, focused on delivering great value and choice to approximately 20 million passengers annually. Revitalised under the ownership of Bain Capital, Virgin Australia is a value carrier which operates a fleet of more than 100 aircraft on 76 routes to 38 destinations across its domestic and short-haul international airline business. The airline has a world class suite of international airline partners which enable its customers to fly to over 650 destinations globally, and last week commenced its own long-haul international services between Australia and Doha through a wet lease with Qatar Airways. Virgin Australia's airline business is supported by the award-winning loyalty program Velocity, which has approximately 80 commercial partners and approximately 13 million members, making it one of the largest loyalty programs in the country. (Photo by James D. Morgan/Getty Images for Virgin Australia )

    Passengers who boarded the Virgin Australia flight from Bali to Brisbane on Thursday had an unpleasant experience. According to reports, the toilets on the plane failed, forcing passengers to urinate in bottles during the six-hour flight. The airline had finally issued an apology addressing the situation, as per reports by Dexerto.

    7News obtained a statement given by the airline, which said,

    "A flight from Denpasar to Brisbane on Thursday evening experienced an issue during the flight, which affected the serviceability of the lavatories. We sincerely [apologize] to our guests and thank our crew for managing a challenging situation on board. We will be crediting guests for the Denpasar to Brisbane flight, and we are proactively reaching out to them to provide this update."

    They further confirmed that all the passengers who were on the particular flight will receive flight credits. They had also reportedly started reaching out to the respective customers directly. While reports claimed that the lavatories stopped functioning while the plane was in mid-air, The Sun reported that one of the lavatories wasn't working even before the flight took off.

    Despite the apparent issue, the flight took off due to a lack of engineering support in Bali. When three hours of the journey were left, the remaining lavatories also stopped functioning, causing massive inconvenience to the passengers. Many described the situation as "degrading" and "deeply uncomfortable."

    Passengers opened up about the incident that occurred inside the Virgin Australia plane due to malfunctioning lavatories

    When all the lavatories began malfunctioning while the plane was mid-air, passengers reportedly had to improvise. While some reportedly used bottles to urinate, others had to endure until they landed in Brisbane. A passenger who was on the flight on Thursday told The Australian,

    "One elderly woman was unable to hold on and suffered the humiliation of wetting herself in public. Midway through the flight, every toilet failed."

    Along with the humiliating experiences, the passengers also had to sit with the overpowering odor that filled the aircraft with urine seeping on the floor. Another passenger shared their experience and said,

    "The cabin crew informed us we would need to relieve ourselves in bottles. It was degrading and distressing, especially for elderly passengers."

    7News reportedly obtained images capturing the clogged toilets of the flight. Emily McMillan, National Assistant Secretary of the Transport Workers' Union, stated that they had contacted the airline and also described the situation as a health hazard for both the passengers and the crew. McMillan then shed light on the apparent issues that aviation workers had been facing lately, impacting their health as well.

    This was one of the incidents that took place to flight passengers, where inconvenience was caused to them due to the fault of the airline in some way or another. Earlier this year, passengers traveling on a United Airlines flight from LA to China were given $15 coupon each.

    This was done because the pilot reportedly turned around upon realising that he was not carrying his passport. 

    TOPICS: Virgin Australia, Flight, Lavatories, Passenger