Media reports indicate that a United Airlines Boeing 787 aircraft flying from Los Angeles to China was forced to turn back after it was discovered that the pilot was flying without a foreign travel passport.

The aircraft departed Los Angeles at 2 PM on Saturday with 257 passengers and 13 crew members, heading northwest across the Pacific Ocean towards Shanghai.

However, after about two hours of flight, the aircraft turned back and returned to San Francisco, landing around 5 PM the same day, according to the FlightAware website.

In a statement released about the incident, United Airlines noted, “The pilot did not have his travel passport on board the aircraft. That evening, we organized a new crew to transport our customers to their destination. Customers were provided with meal vouchers and compensation.”

Nevertheless, the new crew departed again around 9 PM that same night and is expected to be approximately six hours delayed in reaching Shanghai.

The translation captures the key details of the original Sinhala-language article, highlighting the unusual circumstance of a pilot flying internationally without the necessary travel documentation and the subsequent steps taken by the airline to manage the situation.