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A man wouldn’t leave an overbooked United flight, so he was dragged off

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Re: A man wouldn’t leave an overbooked United flight, so he was dragged off

#191

Post by tyingq »

Betting this doesn't end well for United.

It's not 100% clear that they exhausted other reasonable options. They don't say if the 4 employees were a flight crew that NEEDED to be somewhere. There's no indication if there were other employees (not in uniform) that could have been deplaned first. There are other flights, on Sundays, that leave after this one (one at 9pm).

The judgement to go with violence after offering $400, then $800 is odd as well. Surely someone would give up a seat after the next one or two bumps in the offer. The onus is on United, since they didn't identify the issue until after passengers were boarded.

Re: A man wouldn’t leave an overbooked United flight, so he was dragged off

#192

Post by inputcoffee »

chapium wrote: post #173
inputcoffee wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think physical violence is qualitatively different. Consider: suppose a kid lays across your driveway and refuses to budge. Are you allowed to drive over the kid? After all, if everyone starts doing this, you will lose your job and can't feed your own family, right? Well, no. You have to figure out a way. Take a deep breath and call their parents, get an Uber or whatever it takes. The situation would be different i…

I get your point, but being this hyperbolic is not supporting your case.

When we are discussing principles, it is helpful to discuss the extreme case because it clarifies what the possible outcome of the principle is.

Re: A man wouldn’t leave an overbooked United flight, so he was dragged off

#193

Post by Johnny555 »

rhino369 wrote: post #27
ww520 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

United employees taking passenger's seats? That's not overbooked. That's robbery.

Not like united employees going on vacation or to a meeting. But a flight crew going to where they need to be. It's part and parcel of an airline service. If they can't get to where they need to be a flight will have to be delayed or canceled.

And if you have to force people off the plan with the police, the flight will have to be delayed or canceled.

This flight took nearly 4 hours to get to there because of the delay, and it only takes 5 hours to drive, the should have just put their employees in a car.

Re: A man wouldn’t leave an overbooked United flight, so he was dragged off

#194

Post by antoniuschan99 »

KaoruAoiShiho wrote: post #152
67726e wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what do you do when someone refuses to leave? I'm on the doctor's side, United should not overbook a plane and bump a customer to get their own people on board, but when someone refuses to leave what other options do you have? Taze him and drag him off? You'll have to use force to remove someone.

Raise the offer from $800, which is a low amount for an airline overbooking.

From what I've read. Passengers offered $1500 to leave but the employees scoffed at that. Not sure how true though.

Re: A man wouldn’t leave an overbooked United flight, so he was dragged off

#195

Post by pbiggar »

helipad wrote: post #29
pbiggar wrote: post #12

Buried at the bottom: > "The airline eventually cleared everyone from the plane, Bridges said, and did not let them back on until the man was removed a second time — in a stretcher." My reading is they beat him so badly they had to put him in a stretcher. Is that right?

I would imagine it was a form of restraining him.

I'm extremely skeptical. They had a stretcher to hand but no handcuffs?

Re: A man wouldn’t leave an overbooked United flight, so he was dragged off

#196

Post by toomuchtodo »

SamBam wrote: post #186
zeveb wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> With that said, don't drag people off your flights. No matter what it costs you to get staff where they need to be when you make this mistake, it'll be cheaper than the negative publicity of a physical altercation removing a passenger (even if you need to retask a commuter aircraft just to relocate the crew, or ask another carrier to get them there). Of course, that just gives a hecker's veto to anyone insubordinat…

No, what they should have done is exactly what other airlines do when they are overbooked: keep raising the voucher amount until someone volunteers to get off. And if you can't find someone to get off at a price that seems appropriate (which is very unlikely: you're always going to find someone willing to take $1000), work out other arrangements. The moment you've escalated to "we've selected people at random, and we…

Exactly.

Re: A man wouldn’t leave an overbooked United flight, so he was dragged off

#197

Post by tomp »

rdtsc wrote: post #149
vwcx wrote: post #101

The real thing to fear here is the normalization of violence. Good perspective in the WP comments: "The truly shocking thing here is that violence - with the real possibility of serious injury - was viewed as appropriate in a situation that was purely logistical. The airline wanted seats for its own employees. This was not an emergency - such as a terrorist attack or a drunk passenger endangering people. The lack of…

I think United were wrong here (maybe not legally) but morally and, even from their self-interest they took a major PR hit. People involved in this should be getting termination letters immediately. However, I am curious. Once they made the decision to remove him. How could they have done so if he didn't want to move? A taser?

Maybe they could arrest him first? (Handcuffs and everything.) At least he would then realize that the situation is serious. Maybe also flash a gun or something...

Re: A man wouldn’t leave an overbooked United flight, so he was dragged off

#198

Post by panzagl »

So the questions I still have- What's the legal difference between 'Denying Boarding' and kicking someone off?

Can you legally kick someone off an airplane 'just because' (i.e. not oversold/security/safety)?

Who did the removing- law enforcement or United employees?

What's the legality of private employees assaulting someone?

This is all about level of outrage though- whether the guy should sue for civil damages or should file criminal complaints.

Re: A man wouldn’t leave an overbooked United flight, so he was dragged off

#199

Post by inputcoffee »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #157
inputcoffee wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think physical violence is qualitatively different. Consider: suppose a kid lays across your driveway and refuses to budge. Are you allowed to drive over the kid? After all, if everyone starts doing this, you will lose your job and can't feed your own family, right? Well, no. You have to figure out a way. Take a deep breath and call their parents, get an Uber or whatever it takes. The situation would be different i…

Well, in your example, I can't run over the kid, but I can call the cops, and have them come and physically remove him. So that's almost exactly what happened, except that the burly guy wasn't a cop (or at least wasn't in uniform). The cops were there, though, and were (at least tacitly) authorizing the guy to try to physically remove the passenger. Is that legal and/or moral? Or does it have to be a uniformed office…

I thought they were both cops.

Having a cop makes it legal, but the moral question is the one we are arguing.

I think the cop has the responsibility to remove the kid without endangering the kid.

Re: A man wouldn’t leave an overbooked United flight, so he was dragged off

#200

Post by MattSteelblade »

manacit wrote: post #119
MattSteelblade wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From my understanding, you're correct. Deny Boarding can be avoided by checking in early. These people had boarded and the plane was full before the mistake was realized. EDIT: Still unsure as to the legality of this. IDB is well established, but the fact that everyone has boarded is a different matter. Reading the contract of carriage did not bring any more light to this point. And let's be clear, denying someone an…

I believe your understanding is incorrect - someone can be denied boarding regardless of when they have checked into the flight. If there are 100 seats, they may sell 105 tickets and permit 105 people to check in - if they cannot find 5 volunteers they will have to IDB 5 passengers. While the rules aren't printed very well (I just scanned United's Contract of Carriage, and the Federal Code), I believe it counts as an…

Reading through the rules, it would appear that you are correct, though it looks like checking in earlier should make it more unlikely "The priority of all other confirmed passengers may be determined based on a passenger’s fare class, itinerary, status of frequent flyer program membership, and the time in which the passenger presents him/herself for check-in without advanced seat assignment."
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