Passenger Forcibly Removed From Overbooked UA Flight

[anat0l]

Causing physical injury to a person can never be justified to preserve the needs of an extra x passengers.

If that person was a criminal, a harmful or offensive drunk or a person of otherwise deplorable character, I think your opinion would change...

 

[Quickstatus]

If that person was a criminal, a harmful or offensive drunk or a person of otherwise deplorable character, I think your opinion would change...

I think we are talking in the context of the current situation.

 

[dajop]

Re: Pax forcibly removed from United overbooked flight

Is it indeed true that compensation to volunteers is only offered in terms of UA credit/vouchers. If so that would seems a starting point for future options ... perhaps cash would be more persuasive?

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Re: Pax forcibly removed from United overbooked flight

Is it indeed true that compensation to volunteers is only offered in terms of UA credit/vouchers. If so that would seems a starting point for future options ... perhaps cash would be more persuasive?

I think IDB must have a cash option available, VDB can be whatever the airline wants... vouchers, cash, whatever.

 

[ajw373]

Re: Pax forcibly removed from United overbooked flight

Seems the refusals to disembark may have been calm:
New Video Shows What Really Happened BEFORE Passenger Was Dragged Off United Flight - View from the WingNew Video: Passenger Was Calm Before Being Dragged off United Flight - Miles to Memories

Well well well. Wonder if this is what changed the tune of the CEO. And even more disgraceful that the 'random' system and the staff who would have obviously known this choose a connecting passenger to offload.

 

[ajw373]

If that person was a criminal

Technically he was a criminal! He had convictions for some prescription medicine scam 10 years previously.

Not that it matters in this case of course, except of course how the airline got a hold of that and released it to the media as part of their defence.

 

[opusman]

Technically he was a criminal! He had convictions for some prescription medicine scam 10 years previously.

No he didn't. It was a different person with a similar name that the media got hold of.

 

[moa999]

No he didn't. It was a different person with a similar name that the media got hold of.

Further investigation has revealed that was him, albeit it isn't at all relevant to the incident

 

[Skyring]

If that person was a criminal, a harmful or offensive drunk or a person of otherwise deplorable character, I think your opinion would change...

Causing physical injury to people is okay????

Or is it just criminals, drunks, deplorables?

What about, oh, I dunno, Asians?

What classes of people is it okay to assault, do you think? Taxi driver goes the long way, give him a wallop. Jehovahs Witness annoys you, chuck the sanctimonious b*astard out on the street.

 

[JohnPhelan]

Trying to say that delaying 4 passengers is not as important as delaying 70 or 200 passengers is wrong. Each of those 70 or 200 passengers is still an individual and their needs are not any more important than the 4 passengers chosen to be sacrificed.

Any airline, or any business, faced with the choice of causing inconvenience to four people, or inconvenience to 200, will always choose the four. You always minimise the overall (coughulative) harm.

 

[JohnPhelan]

Re: Pax forcibly removed from United overbooked flight

To law enforcement yes... Calm but still not compliant. (Also he's on the phone to someone as well which probably didn't go down well) but we don't have any video of the previous discussions with the crew.

I also suspect that if you refused on order from an Aussie police officer in public (say a move on order) like that, it would be under 60 secs before it got physical.

Yes, exactly. The new video shows him refusing to comply with the directive of the airport police. They can't allow that to continue. And he then dares them to drag him off the plane and put him in jail!

What on earth did he expect would happen next??

 

[JohnK]

Any airline, or any business, faced with the choice of causing inconvenience to four people, or inconvenience to 200, will always choose the four. You always minimise the overall (coughulative) harm.

I'll bet they'll have second thoughts now about the course of action to take in future.

 

[Quickstatus]

But never by assaulting/battering a passenger who broke no law or regulation. There is no scenario by which this is/ or should be permissible

The police should never be an agent for one party in a contractual/civil dispute which in this case they were

 

[dajop]

Re: Pax forcibly removed from United overbooked flight

I think IDB must have a cash option available, VDB can be whatever the airline wants... vouchers, cash, whatever.

Yes but if the only offer for VDB is vouchers then it doesn't take the most intelligent person to work out that cash might be a more attractive option - even a lower amount of cash than the offered voucher value.

 

[ajw373]

Re: Pax forcibly removed from United overbooked flight

Yes, exactly. The new video shows him refusing to comply with the directive of the airport police. They can't allow that to continue. And he then dares them to drag him off the plane and put him in jail!

What on earth did he expect would happen next??

Directives need to be reasonable and I an many seem to think the directive to leave unreasonable.

If it we do have to 100% comply with all police directives, reasonable or not it means we effectively live in a police state. Surely your not saying a police state is acceptable?

 

[Happy Trails]

Re: Pax forcibly removed from United overbooked flight

Yes, exactly. The new video shows him refusing to comply with the directive of the airport police. They can't allow that to continue. And he then dares them to drag him off the plane and put him in jail!

What on earth did he expect would happen next??

+1
I, too, welcome our new airline overlords.

 

[anat0l]

But never by assaulting/battering a passenger who broke no law or regulation. There is no scenario by which this is/ or should be permissible

The police should never be an agent for one party in a contractual/civil dispute which in this case they were

The unfortunate thing is both of those tenets are broken on a daily basis (replace "passenger" with "person" in the first paragraph, and "assaulting/battering" with "assaulting/battering/killing").

That doesn't make them acceptable, though it is comical how much attention this particular incident is being given at the highest levels compared to other alleged miscarriages of justice involving innocent people (some who were never given the chance to defend themselves).

I think part of that has to do with character based assessments which changes how people judge each other, viz. in this case, even if the video was taken and shared, had not most of the pax on board been horrified by the action taken, or indeed cheered on the officers because they can finally get going, the reaction (including at the top level) might have been very different, even though we would have still likely come to the same conclusion that the actions taken were unacceptable.

I guess it also goes to show that the CEO is mainly apologising to save his skin, that he is trying to respond to popular opinion, not that he actually recognises and understands that what was done was wrong.

 

[Mrmaxwell]

But never by assaulting/battering a passenger who broke no law or regulation. There is no scenario by which this is/ or should be permissible

The police should never be an agent for one party in a contractual/civil dispute which in this case they were

Exactly this.

This was civil matter between a civilian and a private company - what do police have to do with it? By the same token if I was trying to board an aircraft with valid boarding pass and the airline was refusing to let me board - can I go to airport police and demand they force the airline to allow me to board? Until a criminal offence is committed Police should not have been on board that flight removing a passenger due to overbooking. All the airline did was make up BS that he was being disruptive and now you have a criminal reason to remove him.

This is just tip of the iceberg in terms of multiple failures here - I can see congress getting involved here ensuring this cannot happen again, and removing the BS incentive cap of US$1350 that an airline can offer.

 

[Skyring]

Re: Pax forcibly removed from United overbooked flight

Directives need to be reasonable and I an many seem to think the directive to leave unreasonable.

If it we do have to 100% comply with all police directives, reasonable or not it means we effectively live in a police state. Surely your not saying a police state is acceptable?

Police are often ignorant of specialised areas of law. Or they will interpret the rules to suit themselves. Or take shortcuts.

If you know the law, you can detect when the cops are just trying it on. I once went straight through a stop sign (slowing to make sure the gate was closed and the way was clear) at an airport gate, got pulled over, and pointed out that as it was a temporary road and hadn't been gazetted, the stop sign had no legal force. That was during the CBR redevelopment, and they kept on changing the roads and taxi zones. NOTHING was gazetted!

They would have given me a ticket and a fine and points off my licence in their ignorance.

 

[JohnPhelan]

Re: Pax forcibly removed from United overbooked flight

Directives need to be reasonable and I an many seem to think the directive to leave unreasonable.

If it we do have to 100% comply with all police directives, reasonable or not it means we effectively live in a police state. Surely your not saying a police state is acceptable?

Whether or not you agree with the police directive, you comply with it at the time. If you believe it is unreasonable/unlawful, you take that up with the relevant authorities subsequently.