When you check into a hotel room, there are certain things you expect to see.
A bed. A TV. Maybe one of those tiny coffee makers that nobody ever seems to clean.
Bats?
Yeah…that probably wasn’t on your hotel bingo card.
But according to a lawsuit filed in Colorado, that’s exactly what happened to a commercial airline pilot who checked into the Sheraton Denver Hotel Downtown in August 2025.
The pilot, who isn’t being identified because he fears it could affect his job, says he was asleep in his room on the hotel’s 22nd floor when he suddenly woke up to a commotion.
Turns out there were bats flying around his room.
According to CBS Colorado, the pilot called hotel maintenance, who removed the bats. Or at least they thought they did.
But the next morning, the pilot says he woke up and found another bat hanging upside down from the curtain rod.
Ummmm….new fear unlocked.
The lawsuit also claims the hotel never sealed a hole beneath the room’s air-conditioning unit, which is where the bats were believed to have gotten in. It also alleges the pilot wasn’t moved to another room after the discovery.
To make matters even worse, the pilot says he found what he believed was a bat bite on his foot. He took photos of the bite, as well as a short video of the bat still hanging out in the room. You can see them on this video from Denver’s local CBS affiliate:
“He was bit by a bat,” his attorney, Ed Lomena, told CBS Colorado. “He was scared he was going to die and leave his family without a father.”
Since bats are one of the primary carriers of rabies in the U.S., doctors don’t generally wait around to see if symptoms develop. According to the lawsuit, the pilot underwent emergency medical evaluation and post-exposure rabies treatment, racking up more than $102,000 in medical bills.
The good news? Denver Animal Protection captured the bat and it ultimately tested negative for rabies.
The bad news? According to the lawsuit, the experience still affects the pilot every time he travels.
His attorney says that because he spends so much of his career staying in hotels, he now routinely checks every room for holes or openings where wildlife might be able to get inside and has trouble sleeping once he’s gets there.
The pilot is seeking damages for medical expenses, emotional distress, injuries, court costs and attorney’s fees. Ultimately, it’ll be up to a jury to decide whether the hotel is legally responsible.
The hotel hasn’t had its day in court yet, so we’ll have to see how the case ultimately plays out.
But one thing seems pretty certain:
If you’ve made it this far into the story, there’s a decent chance you’re going to spend an extra few seconds looking around your next hotel room before you unpack.
I know I would. Because there are some souvenirs from a trip that nobody wants to bring home.
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