Authorities found the body of a teen in the wheel well of a U.S. Air Force plane, Sunday.
The body was discovered after the plane landed at Ramstein Air Base in Germany, a senior defense official told NBC News.
The plane traveled from Germany to Senegal, Mali, Chad, Tunisia and Sicily and landed in Ramstein. The journey lasted just over a week. "At this point, it is unknown where or when the deceased entered the landing gear wheel well," the Pentagon's press secretary, Navy Rear Adm. John Kirby said. He described the deceased as "an adolescent black male, possibly of African origin," the Irish Times reported citing Reuters.
The stowaway shows a serious security breach. A senior official said that the boy might have possibly climbed into the wheel well in Mali. However, it is unclear whether the boy was from Mali or Chad, or how he managed to get past security.
The official added that the boy was far inside the body of the plane and had hidden himself so he was not visible during a routine safety inspection.
Navy spokesperson John Kirby told the Associated Press, "Security is going to be looked at here. Obviously it would be. We try to provide as much security as we can for our aircraft when they're operating in remote locations, and this will all be part of the investigation." .
Last month, in a similar incident a Californian teen Yahye Abdi survived a five hour flight from California to Hawaii stowed away in the wheel of a jet plane. In June, a 17-year-old Norwegian boy was found dead in the wheel well of a KLM flight.
