Mrs Oyedoh was due on April 13, but had been given clearance to take the March
flight by her doctor.
The impromptu delivery was a team effort- passengers with medical training
monitored Mrs Oyedoh’s blood pressure, one passenger timed her contractions
on his watch and another sterilised the provisional delivery tools in vodka.
When the baby boy was delivered the doctor instructed Ms Carnes to cut the
umbilical chord using vodka-cleansed shoe laces donated by a passenger and
scissors.
Then she bundled the baby, who was named Ebosalume, in newspaper and thick
paper towels.
“I took the baby to hand it over and I lifted him across the seats.
And as I did, I noticed everyone was looking at me, and I just raised it up
and said, ‘It’s a boy!’ And the whole aeroplane broke out into applause and
laughter,” Ms Carnes told Fox news.
Fifteen minutes after the delivery, the plane landed after being diverted to
Dakar, Senegal. Mrs Oyedoh and her son were immediately taken to hospital.
The father, Greg, was at home in California when his wife went into labour has
not seen his new son yet.
Mrs Oyedoh will fly back to the US
on Thursday to meet the father.