Category Archives for Passengers.
A United business class passenger reportedly stayed on speaker phone through taxi and the entire safety video, even after flight attendants asked her multiple times to stop. Too many passengers no longer feel embarrassed about behavior that used to be obviously unacceptable.
A passenger flying SAS from Copenhagen to Los Angeles after recent surgery says she wound up getting a 30-minute foot massage from a stranger in coach after an expected empty seat between them disappeared. It is an oddly kind story — three women who did not share a language improvising help for someone in pain — but it also crosses a line that most travelers would not want crossed on a plane.
A Frontier Airlines passenger being removed from a flight under police escort suddenly turned and attacked another traveler who was filming her from a nearby seat.
Delta Flight 69 from Seattle to Taipei was forced to divert to Anchorage after a passenger allegedly grabbed a flight attendant, used the N-word, and threatened to beat him up after landing. What began as an argument over whether a lavatory was occupied escalated into a level-three onboard disturbance serious enough to lock down the cockpit, divert an Airbus A350 heavy with fuel, and end with the passenger in federal custody.
A blind passenger boarded a Delta flight with a seeing-eye dog, only to face complaints from another couple claiming their own dog was a service animal and could not sit nearby. What followed was a familiar modern airline mess: a real working dog, a likely fake one, and a dispute not just over where the animals should sit, but over who got to use the blind passenger’s underseat space.
Passengers flying Frontier from Orlando say they arrived on time, spent about 90 minutes stuck in a long, understaffed check-in line, and still missed their flight because they did not reach the counter before the airline’s one-hour cutoff. Instead of rebooking them or offering compensation, Frontier reportedly treated them as no-shows, demanded a $99 flight change fee, and then called police when the confrontation escalated.
Southwest used to make this simple for passengers of size: get an extra seat and usually receive a refund after travel. Now the airline can publicly flag travelers, make them buy a second seat at walk-up prices
A viral video from New York LaGuardia shows a passenger being taken to the floor by Port Authority Police at the American Airlines check-in counter after what is being circulated online as an attack on another traveler. The clip does not show what started the confrontation, but it does show the worst possible place to cause a scene: an airport, where law enforcement is everywhere.
A United Airlines passenger is suing after her 4-year-old daughter was burned by 200-degree tea during a flight from Newark to Tel Aviv. The bigger story is that even when a young child is seriously hurt onboard, airline liability on international flights is often capped.
A Frontier Airlines flight from San Juan to Atlanta diverted to Miami after a passenger waiting for the lavatory leaned on another traveler, touched his wife, and then fought a third woman who stepped in. The bizarre chain of escalation turned a minor cabin confrontation into a diversion, an arrest, and yet another viral reminder of how fast inflight disorder can spiral.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
