A drunk United Airlines passenger decided to ‘self-deport’ from their flight prior to pushback a week ago, when flight attendants wouldn’t serve him a predeparture cocktail.
As another passenger on the flight from Denver to London Heathrow explained, the business class passenger refused to fly an airline that wouldn’t give him booze right away.
Seemed like he was already pretty drunk. Ranting about how he’s 2.5 million miler and everyone on the plane had already been drinking as well. Real jerk.
The situation was escalating and I was thinking he is definitely getting kicked off. Hoping it wasn’t going to delay us. Well, he loudly grabbed all his stuff and said he’s not flying United, exited the plane. Seems like he thought everyone would be really sad he would no longer be gracing us with his presence.
Usually we see drunk passengers being removed from the aircraft involuntarily. That causes a delay of the flight, and it also frequently gets the passenger banned from the airline (and depending on what they did to gain notice from the crew, it might get them in legal trouble as well).
Here, he wasn’t dragged off the flight. He wasn’t banned from the airline. And everybody got where they were going more or less on-time. However, he didn’t go quietly into that good night: “Loud yelling, threatening lawsuits (lol), screaming that everyone else on flight had already had multiple drinks (fact check: true).”
He claimed he was never going to fly United again because they wouldn’t give him more booze. He wouldn’t be flying them again if he hadn’t excused himself from the flight, most likely! And as a 2.5 million miler he should probably reconsider his stance. The benefits of sticking to United are worth it – especially for someone based in Denver!
Oddly though the rest of the cabin didn’t clap or cheer when he left, “Everyone was pretty much silent hoping he would follow through on his threat to leave.”
Ultimately, more passengers should self-deport from the aircraft when they’re in no condition to fly! Of course, when you’re drunk you’re usually in no position to realize that you should just walk away, either.
(HT: Live and Let’s Fly)
This got me to wondering if a Premiun Passenger would self deport their self from a Premiun Airline?
I’m sure the folks back home won’t mind him being delayed getting back.
“Sir, this is a Wendy’s…”
Here’s an innovative incentive to discourage bad behavior, $$$ or miles compensation for pax ‘self-deplaning’ …. Could it ‘fly’ ??? ….lol
No worries, he left on a later BA flight where he can dance & party in the ‘disco/lav’ !
He could retreat to a lounge to get drinks until his next attempt to fly.
No video – I don’t believe it. Probably just made-up stuff by some redditer looking for clicks/followers.
If the pax “Seemed like he was already pretty drunk.” appeared to be intoxicated, why did CS agents let him on?
@Thing 1 — Bingo.
Speaking of enragement bait… can we somehow make this about ‘race’ or ‘gender’… keep the ‘culture war’ going, son! (Don’t let the peasants realize it was a class war the whole time.)
@1990 – “Sir, this is a Wendy’s…”
The absolute Shakespeare of Reddit-tier sarcasm. You probably rehearse this line in the mirror with dramatic pauses, convinced it’s the comedic apex of Western civilization. I’m sure you drop it into conversations IRL like it’s some kind of mic-drop. The social equivalent of a fax machine screeching to life in 2025. That joke isn’t just dead, it’s been cremated, scattered at sea, and forgotten by time. And yet here you are, dragging its corpse around like it’s fresh. You think you’ve delivered a zinger, but all you’ve done is announce to the world, “Hi, I peaked in 2014 and emotionally imprinted on memes with timestamps.” Bravo, 1990. Bravo. You’ve somehow managed to turn mediocrity into a lifestyle. But by all means, keep ’em coming sport. I can’t wait to read what’s next. Come at me bro.
Or … airlines could just stop serving booze and beer on airplanes.
If someone can’t get through a flight (of any length) without an alcoholic beverage, their next stop should be AA or a detox facility.
I’d honestly pay $100 more to fly on an aircraft without drunks, or the ability for anyone to get drunk.
(I’d pay $100 more for a flight with no children, because children and drunks often behave exactly the same way.)
95% of my flights are in premium class and no there aren’t raging drunks on any of them. In fact I have no recent memory of such incident. Also just casual observations many people in premium cabins do not drink alcoholic beverages at all. So we can stop the drunks are ruining flying.
The guy was a total a hole and UA should ban him from flying UA. Problem solved.