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Your story has the ending as it should be. Not happy due to the circumstances but at least you had the satisfaction of saying the final goodbye to your dad. The attendants were nice/normal to you. That's how it used to be. Now if someone is in one of these unfortunate situations, they are not even treated like a human being. They are called "special snowflakes." And this is what the world has come to.
Now apparently "doing their job" includes a total lack of compassion for a grieving daughter and lying to the captain (if the report was accurate) about just how the passenger was behaving, resulting in another hour long delay to the other passengers.
On almost every flight there is someone flying for the same reasons as the sisters.
They knew he was dying but waited until the last minute to fly.
They could have sat together but even with the impending death of the father they chose to save a few bucks, a time when most people think money is no object.
You can't always get two seats together when you book at the last minute. Do you think I would have chosen to sit 5 rows behind and on the other side of the plane from my 3 year old? That's what I got. The booking agent said, "Don't worry, someone will switch seats." It wasn't that easy.
Except this contradicts what the sisters said themselves. They themselves said one got out of her seat. To me this looks like someone looking for 15 min. of fame and not a trusted source. We don't even know if this woman was on the flight.
Because of the contradictions in the video, I had the same thoughts. The woman in the video at one time said sister number one got up but then said she just held her sister's hand across the aisle and rubbed her shoulder. H'm, next time I fly, I will have to check and see if it's possible to reach across the aisle and be able to rub someone's shoulder over the the distance between the aisle seats. I didn't think anyone could reach that far but I could be wrong.
I did. I took a Greyhound bus to see my father in his final hours. I was very emotional but I managed to keep my emotions in check slightly enough to not cause trouble by not following the rules. Others on that flight probably had sick and dying relatives too but checked themselves just enough to keep order and follow rules. The airline could have managed this far better but the sisters were definitely in the wrong.
I did, too. When mom had a stroke (from which she wouldn't recover, had hours or days) I was three hours away by car. I was very preoccupied and afraid to drive. I didn't want to have an accident and make matters worse. Fortunately, a family member could take me there.
Conversely, I've seen people go three shades of crazy in that situation. You're capable of doing... what you're capable of doing.
Forgive me if this was address or new info came out in the 11 page thread. I'll just say we weren't there so I'll take the words of the fellow passengers who are cleary siding with the sisters.
Saying they should have kept their cool and followed the rules is pretty easy for a messageboard poster to say as they sit in their recliner. Let's see how calm they would be if they were the ones trying to see a dying loved one and were told they were running out of time. This is an unusual circumstance, this was not 2 sophomores acting up as they start spring break, and the flight attendent should have understood this and responded accordingly.
Baloney. As others have said, people fly to dying loved ones every single day, every single hour, every single airline. Nobody, absolutely nobody can possibly think that's unusual. What makes this an unusual circumstance is two women who need to know here and now that they are not exceptions to rules and must respond according to safety protocol. That clearly means Sit Down and Shut Up.
Unusual circumstance? Surely, you jest! This isn't even a good sob story.
Quote:
Originally Posted by DaveinMtAiry
I think part of this clip was posted but here is a good account from the woman direct behind the incident. At no time did anyone leave their seat, one wonan reached across the aisle to console her sister. The flight attendent lied about her behavior and as a result of their overreaction caused every other passenger another hour delay on top of what she did to the sisters.
Trying to see it from the FA's point of view. Taking off and landing are the two most dangerous aspects of air travel. So the FA sees a woman who has already violated safety rules by keeping her phone on maybe unbuckling her seatbelt, we don't know for sure, either getting up or leaning across the aisle. This passenger was doing everything a passenger is not supposed to do in a plane that can at any moment begin its ascent.
The FA does her job and tells the woman to sit in her seat with her seatbelt secured. The woman gives her an argument. The plane is about to take off. There is no time for argument. This now becomes an emergency situation, an unruly passenger not listening to the rules. There are only seconds to try and calm things down but the sister violating the rules is getting more and more unruly.
The FA has a job to do. If the "visiting" sister had been willing to wait until the flight was airborne, none of this had to happen. They allow you to walk around the plane at that time. I don't see this as the FA not being compassionate I see it as a passenger refusing to listen to someone for their and everyone else's own good. You can't afford to break the rules to be compassionate when you are in a huge tube of metal just about to take off into the air and you are in charge of keeping everyone safe. This is the way I see the FA's actions. She had to think of the safety of the entire plane rather than just one person who was thinking only of doing what she wanted to do at the exact time she wanted to do it.
Again, no reason why the unruly woman couldn't have waited a few minutes until they were up in the air and the seat belt sign was off to attend to her sister.
I got reservations for the next day (no sympathy fares there either-do they even exist???)
One of the reasons why I try to keep a stash of frequent flyer miles with the legacy carriers is that I live far way from most of my family and if there is some sort of emergency that requires me to go up to Michigan, 25K United miles and a $80 close in booking fee or 30K Delta miles and $10 in fees is a lot better if I need to be somewhere tomorrow than it would be to pay walk-up coach fares.
One other note- you can sometimes get what are called weight and balance issues on commercial aircraft. For a safe takeoff, weight of passengers, cargo, and fuel needs to be distributed in certain ways throughout the plane. On very rare occasions for the kind of narrowbody jets planes Allegiant flies and more commonly on sub-75 passenger regional jets & turboprops, you'll have the pilot in charge ask flight attendants to move passengers on not entirely full planes from assigned seats to the front or back of the plane in order to get weight & balance numbers right. (The alternative to moving people is apparently to add ballast bags to parts of the cargo area, something that takes additional time and can cause a regional jet at a big airport to miss their assigned takeoff slot)
So if a flight attendant tells you to move six rows back in a small plane, it's very likely for safety reasons, not some sort of power trip.
Baloney. As others have said, people fly to dying loved ones every single day, every single hour, every single airline. Nobody, absolutely nobody can possibly think that's unusual. What makes this an unusual circumstance is two women who need to know here and now that they are not exceptions to rules and must respond according to safety protocol. That clearly means Sit Down and Shut Up.
Unusual circumstance? Surely, you jest! This isn't even a good sob story.
Hon.....your video is clearly an armchair idiot. The woman left her seat at the front of the plane to go console her sister at the back of the plane.
Good God! Talk about needing to read an entire thread! You should start at Page 1. Please.
Sure it happens every day. But how many of the 1.7 MILLION passengers who fly daily are going to see a dying loved one? 10% is boyond a reach but even at that figure 90% are not. So yeah, by any definition this was an unusual situation.
I admitted in my opening post that I am not interested in reading 11 pages of posts, knowing they would be full of replies like yours. I'll ask again: Have any passengers who witnessed the situation come forward and backed the flight attendent's bahavior? Anyone? Until I see that I'm going with the accounts from the witnesses over those who apparently believe everyone should remain perfectly calm and rational upon hearing their father has hours to live.
Last edited by DaveinMtAiry; 01-07-2017 at 03:33 PM..
Sure it happens every day. But how many of the 1.7 MILLION passengers who fly daily are going to see a dying loved one? 10% is boyond a reach but even at that figure 90% are not. So yeah, by any definition this was an unusual situation.
I admitted in my opening post that I am not interested in reading 11 pages of posts, knowing they would be full of replies like yours. I'll ask again: Have any passengers who witnessed the situation come forward and backed the flight attendent's bahavior? Anyone? Until I see that I'm going with thd accounts from the witnesses over athose who apparently believes everyone should remain perfectly calm and rational upon hearing their father has hours to live.
The sister herself said she went to the back of the plane to console her sister.
Had you merely read Post 1, you would know that. But keep pontificating. It's amusing.
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