Venous air embolism is a major hazard during surgical procedures in the sitting position and is known to cause acute pulmonary edema in animal experiments (6, 7, 17). In man some cases of pulmonary edema immediately following air embolism have been described (10, 15, 16). In this case report we present a patient that developed pulmonary edema which became apparent several hours after the occurrence of air embolism.