United flight diverted over passenger's unruly behavior on meal choices
Unruly passengers in fights have been dominating headlines for quite some months now. Joining the bandwagon is the latest incident of an unruly business class passenger who disrupted a United Airlines flight over the unavailability of his first meal choice. Reportedly, this incident caused the aircraft that was heading from Houston to Amsterdam to dump fuel and get diverted to Chicago.
It caused a delay in landing at the Amsterdam airport
The flight departed Houston at 4:20 pm local time, on Sunday. The aircraft circled Chicago's O'Hare airport to use up gasoline, a process known as "dumping fuel," to prevent the flight from being too heavy to land, according to flight tracking website Flightradar24. The flight landed at about 12.30 pm local time in Amsterdam, over three hours after its scheduled arrival the following day.
The flight took a long time to reach the destination
'Disruptive pax'
The flight was diverted due to "disruptive pax on board, seat 11G, threat level 1," the lowest level of threat, according to internal United communication shared by aviation watchdog JonNYC. "But, to my way of thinking, this person had to be exceedingly disruptive for them to have handled it this way," tweeted JonNYC adding that the person might also be intoxicated.
Checkout the tweet
The passenger was detained in Chicago
According to United Airlines when the flight was diverted to Chicago and made a safe landing at O'Hare International Airport, the passenger in question was detained by local officials. "Law enforcement met the aircraft at the gate and escorted the passenger off the plane. The aircraft then continued to Amsterdam," the United airline said in a statement to The Guardian.
The cause of the disturbance is unclear
It is not clear what food or service the passenger was upset over. Generally, business class passengers flying from Newark to Amsterdam are served a three-course meal. The menu includes seared beef short rib, seared lemon grass salmon, ricotta salata, and wild honey manicotti as their main meal, according to travel review website Live and Let's Fly.
Imposing fines
For disruptive behavior, the Federal Aviation Administration may fine passengers up to $37,000 for each infraction, with each occurrence having the potential for several infractions. Criminal charges may also be brought against such passengers. An incident involving disruptive passengers occurred once every 568 flights in 2022, according to data released earlier this year by the International Air Transport Association (IATA).
Similar cases in India
Recently, there have been many similar incidents reported on Indian flights where the passengers disobeyed the flight rules. A case in point was the case of Shankar Mishra, who allegedly urinated on an elderly co-passenger on an Air India flight. Similarly, in May this year, a passenger on a flight from Goa to Delhi abused the crew members, resorting to unruly behavior.
