Passenger Collapsed And Died Of Ebola At Gatwick Airport

A passenger from Sierra Leone, one of the countries with the highest number of Ebola victims collapsed and died as she got off a plane at Gatwick airport in London, UK.

Airport staff said they were terrified the virus could spread globally through the busy international hub from the West African country which is in the grip of the deadly epidemic.

The woman, said to be 72, became ill on the gangway after she left a Gambia Bird jet with 128 passengers on board.

She died in hospital on Saturday.

Ebola has killed 256 people in Sierra Leone. A total of 826 have died in West Africa since the outbreak began in February.

Tests were carried out to see if the woman had the disease.

The plane was quarantined as ­officials desperately tried to trace everyone who had been in contact with the woman.

According to an eyewitness, the woman was sweating buckets and vomiting when paramedics arrived to try and help her. The next thing everybody was there… emergency crews, airfield operations, even immigration.

The plane carrying the woman came from Freetown in Sierra Leone. It stopped at Banjul in The Gambia before landing in Gatwick.

One ­official added that Public Health England is aware a passenger arriving on a flight from The Gambia that landed at Gatwick airport on Saturday fell ill shortly after disembarking.

At 11pm on Sunday, the Department of Health said that tests for the deadly Ebola virus on the woman who died at Gatwick had proved negative.