Fox's Laura Ingraham says she got stuck on a plane for 8 hours, forcing her to call into her own show to say why she couldn't make it

• Laura Ingraham says she was forced to miss her own Fox News show after a United Airlines diversion.
• Jeanine Pirro hosted in her absence on a night of key developments in Trump's New York trial.

A top Fox News host says she was stranded on a much-delayed flight on Tuesday, causing her to call into her own show to explain why she couldn't make it.

Laura Ingraham, host of the primetime The Ingraham Angle, posted to X on Tuesday to say that her United Airlines flight from Washington DC to Houston had been diverted to Austin.

The trip — which ordinarily takes about three hours — had kept her in the air for seven and a half hours, she wrote.

She added: "Forced to miss the show on this huge news night."

On Tuesday, lawyers presented their closing arguments in former President Donald Trump's criminal hush-money trial in New York.

Fox News and its affiliates maintain studios all over the country — previously including a vastly expensive home setup built during the pandemic for its then-star Tucker Carlson — but even Rupert Murdoch's empire can't broadcast a show from midair.

United Airlines' X account responded to Ingraham's post apologizing and promising to look into the issue.

The airline did not immediately respond to Business Insider's request for comment, sent outside of working hours.

Fox News confirmed to Mediaite that Ingraham had been slated to host her show from Houston.

Instead, at short notice, Jeanine Pirro stepped in.

But midway through the show, Ingraham called in, with Pirro greeting her: "Hello, Laura. I hear you're at an airport or on a plane somewhere."

"Oh yeah — eight hours friendly skies of United Airlines. It wasn't so friendly today, but that's all right, everybody was nice and patient," she said.

Apologizing for her absence, she said there was "literally no way I could get to a studio in time given what happened on the airline with the weather and mechanical problems."

But, she said, "I followed everything that was happening today and continues to happen in Manhattan."

Ingraham then railed against what she called the "weaponization of the judicial system," adding: "I thought I was mad about the flight delays, but I'm really mad about this."

Fox News didn't immediately respond to BI's request for comment, sent outside of working hours.

Correction: May 29, 2024 — An earlier version of this story misstated the name of Fox News' founder. It is Rupert Murdoch, not Robert Murdoch.