Narrative:

About 5 to 10 minutes after takeoff sitting in the R2 jump seat I smelled something really bad; like body odor. It came on very strong and then I realized it was the stinky sock smell that I've heard others talk about with aircraft contamination. I asked another flight attendant who was sitting next to me in the aisle aft jump seat and he said yes he did smell it and was just bout to say something. I called the a flight attendant and asked her to come back quickly. She did and right away said she smelled it to call the captain. I did and reported our experience. The captain asked if we were feeling nauseous. I said no; but a little light headed. He said ok we will go back. The three of us in back went to the front galley as the fumes/smell weren't up there.the captain called and asked one of us to go back so he could do some checks. The a flight attendant went; spoke to him on the inter phone. When she came back she said the smell was now moving to the forward part of the cabin. I was starting to feel tingles in my hands and feet and a little dizzy. We waited to take our aft jumpseats until right before landing as to not be breathing in contaminated air. When we went to the back the smell seemed to change to an almost sweet ammonia type cleaning smell. We landed and the captain over the PA said 'remain seated; remain seated.' he then called all flight attendants and told us the doors are disarmed and to open all doors except R1. We opened our doors and placed the safety strap across doors L2 and R2.the fire department was outside and firemen came to the back of the aircraft to ask what happened. We told them and at that time they didn't smell anything. The first officer called back and asked if we wanted medical attention. We all said we did. We were still feeling funny; light headed; dizzy and tingling. It wasn't as bad as in air but it was definitely not gone. We waited for at least 40 minutes on the aircraft for the paramedics to come. While waiting a representative came and asked us questions for his paperwork. He told us we actually needed to go to a facility for our blood to be tested and only certain places could do that. He also gave us the number to get that worked out. Paramedics came and at that point we said we were told we need to go someplace specific and we didn't need them. They left.we [got a ride] to a medical center. We waited and were there for at least 2 hours. When we finally saw the nurse practitioner he took our blood pressure; listened to our lungs; looked in our ears and eyes and said that first of all they don't test for carbon monoxide unless the believe we were exposed and he thought we weren't since we smelled something. He said carbon monoxide is odorless and we would need to be exposed for 5 or 6 hours to be poisoned. I gave him the information regarding the type of gas/oil etc. We used so that he would know what we were possibly exposed to. He dismissed it and us. So it was a complete waste of time. We were still feeling symptoms but they were dissipating and we were all exhausted. We got rooms at a really crappy hotel in a bad area of town. The room I was given smelled like bad cigarette smoke; I asked to change rooms and apparently there was not one single other room available. I slept in another flight attendant's room as it was too late to find another hotel for myself. We finally were in our rooms. Make sure our aircraft are safe before we fly them. There should be a protocol of exactly what should happen after an event like this. No one was prepared or knew exactly what should happen next. Send a crew to a location for testing that knows exactly what this situation is and are familiar with it.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: A Flight Attendant reported feeling ill from odors in the cabin.

Narrative: About 5 to 10 minutes after takeoff sitting in the R2 jump seat I smelled something really bad; like body odor. It came on very strong and then I realized it was the stinky sock smell that I've heard others talk about with aircraft contamination. I asked another Flight Attendant who was sitting next to me in the aisle aft jump seat and he said yes he did smell it and was just bout to say something. I called the A flight attendant and asked her to come back quickly. She did and right away said she smelled it to call the Captain. I did and reported our experience. The Captain asked if we were feeling nauseous. I said no; but a little light headed. He said ok we will go back. The three of us in back went to the front galley as the fumes/smell weren't up there.The Captain called and asked one of us to go back so he could do some checks. The A Flight Attendant went; spoke to him on the inter phone. When she came back she said the smell was now moving to the forward part of the cabin. I was starting to feel tingles in my hands and feet and a little dizzy. We waited to take our aft jumpseats until right before landing as to not be breathing in contaminated air. When we went to the back the smell seemed to change to an almost sweet ammonia type cleaning smell. We landed and the Captain over the PA said 'Remain Seated; Remain Seated.' He then called all Flight Attendants and told us the doors are disarmed and to open all doors except R1. We opened our doors and placed the safety strap across doors L2 and R2.The fire department was outside and firemen came to the back of the aircraft to ask what happened. We told them and at that time they didn't smell anything. The First Officer called back and asked if we wanted medical attention. We all said we did. We were still feeling funny; light headed; dizzy and tingling. It wasn't as bad as in air but it was definitely not gone. We waited for at least 40 minutes on the aircraft for the paramedics to come. While waiting a representative came and asked us questions for his paperwork. He told us we actually needed to go to a facility for our blood to be tested and only certain places could do that. He also gave us the number to get that worked out. Paramedics came and at that point we said we were told we need to go someplace specific and we didn't need them. They left.We [got a ride] to a medical center. We waited and were there for at least 2 hours. When we finally saw the nurse practitioner he took our blood pressure; listened to our lungs; looked in our ears and eyes and said that first of all they don't test for carbon monoxide unless the believe we were exposed and he thought we weren't since we smelled something. He said carbon monoxide is odorless and we would need to be exposed for 5 or 6 hours to be poisoned. I gave him the information regarding the type of gas/oil etc. we used so that he would know what we were possibly exposed to. He dismissed it and us. So it was a complete waste of time. We were still feeling symptoms but they were dissipating and we were all exhausted. We got rooms at a really crappy hotel in a bad area of town. The room I was given smelled like bad cigarette smoke; I asked to change rooms and apparently there was not one single other room available. I slept in another Flight Attendant's room as it was too late to find another hotel for myself. We finally were in our rooms. Make sure our aircraft are safe before we fly them. There should be a protocol of exactly what should happen after an event like this. No one was prepared or knew exactly what should happen next. Send a crew to a location for testing that knows exactly what this situation is and are familiar with it.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.