A United airlines flight attendant has sparked significant backlash after sharing a Paris layover story online. She and her fellow crewmembers left a junior flight attendant behind at Charles de Gaulle Airport. Rather than feeling bad about this, she criticized the colleague for being “cheap” and bringing her own food which caused them to separate.
While she doesn’t identify her employer, they flew Newark – Paris. The junior flight attendant asked to store a sandwich and yogurt she purchased the night at the grocery in the plane’s chilled storage, explaining that “Paris is so expensive.” She didn’t know if there was space, so it sounds like she doesn’t work this aircraft often.
When the flight landed on the other side of the Pond, the crew hurried to deplane and board their van to the layover hotel.
After exiting the aircraft, the junior flight attendant realized she had forgotten her food and briefly went back to retrieve it. In the short time it took her to do this, the other crew members had already boarded the van and departed for their hotel.
The oversight was realized only when the van driver received a call from a gate agent alerting them that one flight attendant had been inadvertently left behind.
- The TikTok creator, recounting the story in her viral video, emphasized it wasn’t her responsibility to collect or remember her colleague’s food, suggesting instead the moral of the incident was to avoid being “cheap.”
- She implied that buying basic food items like a sandwich and yogurt in Paris wouldn’t cause financial hardship, she could ‘still pay her rent’ and it was her fault for economizing.
We land, we deplane, we grab our things to leave the airplane, to get on the van to go to our hotel. As we’re walking up the jet bridge, the flight attendant asks me, ‘did you get my food?’ No, why would I get your food? I’m not here to get your food.
…The purser looks at all the crew members and says, ‘if you’re not here, raise your hand,’ to which I laughed at.
@life.with.oatmeal Storytime. Cheap flight attendant was left on the plane in Paris. #lifewithoatmeal #storytime #paris #flightattendant ♬ original sound – Life With Oatmeal
Mostly flight attendants reacting to the video online are appalled, suggesting this woman “doesn’t have your back” and isn’t someone they’d want to fly with. The first rule is never leave a crewmember behind.
One Mile at a Time‘s take is, “The moral of the story should be to make sure everyone is accounted for before driving to the hotel. Instead, this woman’s conclusion is to not be cheap.”
Paddle Your Own Kanoo thinks that “[f]or a US-based flight attendant, a layover in Paris is not expensive” though I think that misses the point. If you’re junior crew, your pay is very much, so you’re likely trying to save as much of your per diem as possible to cover regular expenses. Ultimately he concludes that “there is a collective responsibility amongst all the crew, and especially the purser, to ensure that all the crew members are in the van and no one has been left behind.”
My take here is a little bit different. If the rest of the crew were not going to wait, then they had a responsibility to communicate that so that the flight attendant could decide whether to go back for their food and fend for themselves for transportation, or stick with the group. That was the major fail.
They didn’t count the crew. “Raise your hand if you’re not here” is obviously careless. This flight attendant had just spoken with their junior colleague at the end of the flight. She clearly knew they weren’t all together. Blame it on an overnight flight, but that comes off as disingenuous when she’s explaining why it’s actually not her responsibility to keep track of other flight attendants.
A senior F/A makes considerably more than a junior F/A who may be trying to cut layover expenses in a high dollar city like Paris. Totally unprofessional for the Lead Purser to leave anyone unaccounted for on departing either the airport or the hotel. If the Flightdeck crew were on the same van (which nowadays may not be the case) I’m surprised the Captain (I certainly did) didn’t watch out for his crew since the overall responsibility rests with him!
Moral of the story: Teamwork makes the dream work.
She’s obviously a junior flight attendant with minimal international experience (at least in Europe). The TicTok-er putting this amount of energy into mocking her does not speak to the esprit de corps necessary during a normal flight, much less during an emergency.
Posting that video, apparently thinking it was a positive reflection on herself, tells me everything I need to know about that person’s moral compass.
Is it legal to import food into France? I know that doing so into the US would be a Customs violation. I believe the import of meat & dairy products are prohibited into France.
Hmm. Bringing a sandwich with certain fillings may not be acceptable. I think. Otherwise the whole scenario seems off. I always suspicious about social media posting like this.
Teamwork makes the dreamLiner work.
clearly being unionized didn’t fix or eliminate the problem
and, French customs and agriculture might be a bit more attentive to US FAs than they have been.
They left her behind. Suck it up and move on. They’re not very nice colleagues but this feels like a victimless crime here…said the hardcore Gen x’er.
There is no excuse, whatsoever, for this nasty, crude, and abusive behavior. Given the ignorant and disingenuous excuses offered by this woman, and the cruel question by the other flight “attendant” it would come as no surprise that this is usual behavior. This is my opinion only and others may disagree.
@ Gary — If she worked for DL, none of this woud be a problem since they pay so well. Rolleyes…
She looks exactly as I imagined.
@.Dot don’t disagree with, but not sure I’m aligned with what’s implied. Personally, while I think the behavior of the FA mocking her colleague was rude, it’s not abusive and labeling it as such only contributes to America’s snowflake culture.
One could argue that it was the junior FA that was rude and selfish. She was willing to delay 10 of her colleagues getting to their hotel and going to sleep after working all night. And this would not be a small delay. It also delays the shuttle form moving in to its next assignment, delaying those people.
If the junior FA is adult enough to be entrusted with the safety of the souls on the airplane she’s adult enough to find her own way to the airport after making a choice to go back for less than $10 worth of food. To complain about it is just as selfish and unprofessional as what the other FA did.
There are two sides to every story. Neither side is entirely the victim here.
Fly the Friendly Skies
Next time they’ll give the junior flight attendant the “David Dao” treatment.
The gal that made the video is one that is always late for pickup. The crew waits for queen Latisha, and when she finally boards the van she says nothing to the Captain and the rest of the crew.
I thought they left her in the jetway and headed back to Newark one FA short!
Yeah, of course buying some food in Paris won’t bankrupt them. So what? Bringing your own lunch is an excellent way to save money. Some people, no matter how much they’re making, just keep increasing their spend and wonder why they are just treading water financially (or have taken out loans etc. and in fact are in debt). Some don’t. Kudos to the junior F/A for trying to stay in the second group.
If this is how flight attendants treat each other, imagine how they treat the passengers?
@hwertz totally agree. Kudos to anyone trying to be responsible with their resources. I respect that. Where it gets tricky is striking the balance between something you value versus something I value. In the case of this thread: I might value saving money in food, while Tammy values getting to the hotel and going to bed.
Who’s “value” matters more? If we could solve for this I suppose we could solve for Karens, cancel culture, fragile masculinity, melting snowflakes and everyone else with The Vapors.
The US carrier I work for, this would NEVER happen. The 5 minutes she took to get her FOOD is nothing. We take care of each other because the companies sure won’t.
We actually have a strict rule we are not allowed to leave the airport/hotel until everyone is accounted for.
@ CHRIS — You are aracist. Not imagined. Did you stop using your David R Miller handle?
@gene it wouldn’t have happened at DL because most crews who work international flights are senior talk to junior crew and look out for them. It has nothing to do with pay. Junior fas at ANY airline barely make anything. Just say you don’t like dl leave it at that cause you definitely sound like a bitter hater
Nigel Long says:
Nice way to avoid the real issue. What a gem you are!
I would call this toxic work attitude and juvenile actions!! Totally uncalled for. . .
If this is the way this young lady treats her fellow crew members, I can only imagine how she treats her passengers. I worked flights for several years on international lines to Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. This person’s attitude would have never been tolerated by the company for which I worked.
Yes, a simple cup of coffee and a croissant or pastry in France could put a pretty good dent in the F/A’s per diem, let alone eating in places like Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, or Jeddah SA turnarounds between there and Nigeria when I worked hadj flights. You bet I brought food in my suitcase! It subsidized my base pay, and living in NYC, I needed all the help I could get!
This is the most poorly written story I’ve ever read. Did AI produce it? I don’t even know which airport the Jr FA got stranded in, if that indeed is what happened.
Mean Girl attitude.
So the people making more money mock the person making less? Classy!
What an ugly and evil bitch