Category Archives for Passengers.
An American Airlines passenger turned their seat back into a makeshift closet. From jackets and bags to hair draped over seat backs, airlines sell tight quarters – leaving passengers to fight over where one person’s comfort ends and another’s seat begins.
A Frontier Airlines flight attendant turned boarding into a cabin lockdown, announcing that someone had smuggled a dog onboard and telling passengers to “snitch on your neighbor” until the hidden pet was found. Instead of quietly fixing a policy problem, the airline effectively deputized a full plane of customers to police each other.
George Santos, the former New York congressman whose fraud case left him owing hundreds of thousands of dollars, bragged on social media about refusing a $900 Delta offer to give up his seat on an oversold shuttle flight.
A TikTok video of a passenger grinding beans and pulling a fresh espresso shot in economy has people furious and fascinated in equal measure. Is a full barista setup at your seat a clever way around terrible airline coffee — or just another way to be the most annoying person on the plane?
A rant about deplaning etiquette has gone viral, laying down what she calls the “one rule” when a flight arrives: you wait your turn and don’t rush the aisle. In her view, anyone who pushes forward past rows in front of them is “human dirt” who deserves the side-eye of the entire cabin. It taps straight into one of the most bitter fights in air travel today: is it row-by-row courtesy, or every passenger for themselves?
An American Airlines passenger on a five hour Airbus A321neo flight showed up in row 37 with AirPods Max for every flight attendant and pilot, and wound up in first class after a passenger up front insisted on trading seats with him. Most people see it as heartwarming holiday gratitude for crew, but others question whether a filmed, high-dollar gift like this crosses the line into performative tipping and bribery-adjacent special treatment.
A Flydubai flight from Dubai to Moscow was delayed on the ground after a drunk Russian passenger boarded already agitated, demanded more alcohol, and then tried to turn the drama into flirtation with the man seated next to her. When crew refused to serve her and asked her to calm down, she turned on them instead, yelling in the aisle until airport police boarded, escorted her off the aircraft, and ground staff had to go digging through the hold to pull her bags.
A Louisiana man got stuck at the exit of New Orleans airport’s short-term parking garage when his payment card was declined. Unable to pay—and refusing to move—he allegedly called the airport operations center twice with bomb threats, hoping an evacuation would open the gates. Now he faces up to 10 years in federal prison.
A WestJet passenger tried to record an agent’s explanation for why his family was suddenly bumped to a later flight. Instead, the agent grabbed his phone, tore up their boarding passes, and struck the passenger’s 73-year-old father hard enough to leave him with a swollen eye.
Video from a Spirit Airlines flight from Nashville to Las Vegas shows a male passenger punching a flight attendant in the face in the aisle, with the cabin turning into a brief brawl until a crewmember steps in and shuts it down. Here is what we know about the incident, what likely happened next, and how this fits into the broader problem of assaults on flight attendants.
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 »
