101 Students kicked off of AirTran Flight

[BTyyj]

http://www.cnn.com/2013/06/03/us/new-yo ... -off-plane

[pdw]

A whole slew of cellphones not turned off, and no gaurantee that they would remain so if they eventually were off. Doesn't sound like the flight crew were being taken seriously, or very confident it was going to go well. Why were they not behaving ? No sleep, too tired ?

The airline did a great job putting them on other flights, in smaller groups. Great lesson for the kids, and nobody got hurt. PIC is in charge of safety on the aircraft, ... didn't have to be that way but that's what happened. How would it have been different ... we will never know, but everyone is safe, as the story ends. Interesting story though, hope that's the end of it for the kid's sake, no sense to making a mountain out of a molehill now.

[CID]

A hundred teenagers is a recipe for disaster in an airplane. The chances of at least a quarter of them acting out, being loutish and shrugging off authority is 100%.

The airline could have put up with it and carried on as many of them do but once in awhile you just need to put your foot down and give kids a big dose of reality. I applaud AirTran for not putting up with this foolishness on this occasion.

I travel on the airlines a lot and find that there are always a few that fall in to this category. It's incredible to me that there are so many people in the world that don't know how to behave in public.

[parallel60]

Well said CID. Good job Air Tran Crew.

[crazy_aviator]

MODERATED to say: Really, Crazy? Give your head a shake, and stow the anti-semitic drivel elsewhere, please.

[YYCcrew]

Wow. I am a little embarrassed, as a Jew I don’t see how or where they were treated differently than anyone else. I find it SO interesting that 15, 16, 17 year old teenagers are using the words "stewardess" and "air stewardess"... For crying out loud those terms stopped being used over 40 years ago now... Ignorance.

I guess for me it all goes back to the dual role, that a Flight Attendant is the brand ambassador on the aircraft, AND most importantly they are ALSO the safety professional responsible to the Captain for the safe operation of the Cabin.

Kudos to this crew.

[Chaxterium]

I was reading about this a couple days ago and apparently the school has started an investigation because they feel the flight crew blew everything out of proportion. First of all, I call bullshit on that. For a flight crew to actually ask passengers to leave the aircraft they more than likely have a damn good reason.

Second of all isn't the authority of the captain pretty much beyond question in this scenario? I believe the FAA puts even more power behind the captain nowadays so I can't see the school having much of a leg to stand on.

Good on the crew.

Cheers,
Chax

[dashx]

How to behave in airplanes 101.

[pdw]

There was that accident not that long ago with a larger group who all perished, where on the voice tape a stewardess is heard commenting over an item moved forward and/or blocking the isle in the aircraft so the PIC went aft to look (sounded like it was heavy enough to affect loading if that included more people crowding forward) ... also a distraction during flight-planning etc.

Not saying the same as here, just that any evidence of trouble (the crew voice interactions over this issue) is on the voice-tape for later review in the event there is an accident.

The Captain in charge of flying this young group is obviously not intimidated by the threat, the miscellaneous interference, and swiftly chooses to abort taking this group along as things start to get out of hand.

Where somewhere else, an older group, in another country, there might be more repercussions to standing your ground as a pilot/PIC (ie fear of losing the company's customer) where misbehavers disrupt order on an aircraft in disregard (perhaps not even knowing) of the potential affect on aircraft safety.