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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

#211

Post by colmvp »

lightbyte wrote: post #174
Flammy wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They messed up and overbooked the flight, sure. To be clear, every flight is overbooked. The airlines have run the numbers, and it is clearly more profitable to sell (for example) 105% of the plane, and then if more than 100% show up, pay people off to take a different flight.

That's a horrible reason in my opinion. What other industry could get away with doing this? If someone sold 105% capacity for a concert or sports game and just told the last 5% who arrived "sorry, no more room" people would be extremely upset.

Don't hotels do the same thing too?

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

#212

Post by JumpCrisscross »

whitepoplar wrote: post #20
rhino369 wrote: post #8

The outrage mob is pushing this pretty hard. Booting people off a plane is pretty shitty behavior for an airline. It's bad customer service and they should dealt with it earlier than after boarding. But if they have to do it, the passenger shouldn't be allowed to just refuse. This guy did. And he had to get dragged off the plane. I don't really see an alternative other than just letting anyone willing to scream to st…

I think you're wrong. They should have upped their monetary incentive until someone left voluntarily. It was their business fuckup, not the passenger's, and they should pay for it.

Book the employees you forgot to reserve seats for on another airline. This wasn't a situation of one person leaving or an entire flight, down the line, being delayed for want of crew. It was between a paying passenger leaving or the airline having to pay more to ship their crew around.

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

#213

Post by enraged_camel »

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?

Simple: they announce that the plane is not taking off until enough seats open up. Then just wait.

Sure, the flight would be delayed, perhaps significantly, but the impact of that would pale in comparison to this horrendous PR controversy.

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

#214

Post by r00fus »

ryandrake wrote: post #160

My predictions: 1. There will be no personal consequences for any of the belligerents involved in this, including the airline employees and police officers. Nobody is going to get fired. 2. The victim will receive no compensation for his injuries, instead will be further victimized in the courts. 3. There will be no business cost to United. They are already known as one of the most awful airlines in the world, and pe…

I think you're wrong about #3. Quantized at the micro-level (individuals may not choose differently), it's certainly unlikely that people will suddenly change their patterns in large droves immediately.

However that might also still result in people deciding not to fly or switch loyalties where they are flexible (ie, someone having lots of miles in several air programs without any restriction to use UA flights).

Stochastically speaking, this event will likely have an impact if anyone at UA cares to look for it months from now.

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

#215

Post by tyingq »

mintplant wrote: post #69
jessaustin wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The plane was full before all the United employees showed up? Yeah they should have gotten there sooner, but in previous situations when I knew the plane would wait on me I've been the last to board...

I don't think that answers lamby's question. Surely they know how many of their own employees will be flying ahead of time?

>Surely they know how many of their own employees will be flying ahead of time?

They don't always. Crews call in sick, flights get cancelled, weather changes schedules, incoming flight being late delays connecting flight, etc. One aircraft type gets swapped for another (not all crews are qualified on all aircraft).

Last minute crew moves will always exist.

It's also not 100% clear that these employees were essential crew, or that they couldn't have taken a different flight. There's usually a range of employees flying, not all classed as "must ride", and often some that shouldn't be classified as "must ride".

Of course, how you choose to open up seats is up to you.

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

#216

Post by uptown »

walterbell wrote: post #154
eximius wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you seen the video? It isn't clear to me if he's unconscious or just limp.

One article claimed that a stun gun was used, hence the need to drag him out. Edit: it was a tweet quoted by Vanity Fair, http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2017/04/united-airlines-passe...

They also smashed his face against the arm rest. That seems like it may have been a contributing factor.

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

#217

Post by ErikAugust »

dboreham wrote: post #161
ErikAugust wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Was the person doing the assaulting federal law enforcement? Was he arrested? I don't think either of these are true. So, I don't think this is how any of this actually works.

It turns out that airline crew have infinite powers on their own planes (well...nearly). They can actually thrown someone off a plane on a whim. Source: I saw this happen last year.

Right, you can "throw" people off a plane. But if you do so in a manner that is totally illegal, you have still broken a law in doing so. That would be my point.

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

#218

Post by rhino369 »

whitepoplar wrote: post #20
rhino369 wrote: post #8

The outrage mob is pushing this pretty hard. Booting people off a plane is pretty shitty behavior for an airline. It's bad customer service and they should dealt with it earlier than after boarding. But if they have to do it, the passenger shouldn't be allowed to just refuse. This guy did. And he had to get dragged off the plane. I don't really see an alternative other than just letting anyone willing to scream to st…

I think you're wrong. They should have upped their monetary incentive until someone left voluntarily. It was their business fuckup, not the passenger's, and they should pay for it.

The passenger fucked up by refusing to leave. That is forcing a physical confrontation when it isn't needed.

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

#220

Post by AnimalMuppet »

denom wrote: post #68
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, the mistake was United's. But the passenger also acted unreasonably. If you act like a two-year-old - even in a situation that, initially, totally isn't your fault - then you may get treated like a two-year-old. And if you act like a two-year-old after the cops start telling you to leave, they're typically going to make you leave - using whatever level of force is required to do so. So, yes, the initial fault i…

But if he had the right to his seat, then why should he leave?

Once the cops show up and tell him to? Because the cops told him to, that's why.

Note well: I am not saying that the cops are always right. I am not saying that we should all be good little citizens and obey whatever the authority figures tell us to do. I am saying that, in the actual world we live in, disobeying police orders will often involve painful physical consequences, almost immediately. You can argue about whether that should be. Fine. I'm saying that it is that way, though, and you'd better plan on it being that way in your situation before you decide to ignore what the cops tell you to do.

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