More often than not when we see air traffic control interactions where someone loses their patience, it’s the air traffic controller with an attitude, and not the pilot. Here’s a case where a United Airlines captain had an unnecessarily bad attitude, with an ironic twist at the end…
Continue reading: Cranky United 787 Captain Rude To Newark ATC, But Karma Gets Him Back
Share your questions, experiences, and thoughts below.
If I were a UA pilot I would always be cranky for working for an airline that operates out of Newark
@lucky; dang why did you have to put the FO on blast? Could it possibly be that the captain might have been riding the FO for the whole trip or that leg and just got him flustered as they swapped controls (if the FO was the PF on that leg)? Yea the FO might have been relatively new or just having a bad day and behind on the situational awareness on the radio calls. Either way come on now..
Still I get it, gotta get that engagement/article clicks on your end. Just feels weird to see you post an article like this.
@ Rob -- You're right, it's possible the captain was a jerk the whole trip, and made the first officer uncomfortable. But is that really an excuse to repeatedly not get a basic read back correct? If bad energy in the cockpit can be blamed for that, I'd hate to think what would happen in an actual emergency.
Off topic, Lucky, but check this out…
“Humanoid robots to become baggage handlers in Japan airport experiment”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/apr/28/humanoid-robots-baggage-handlers-japan-airports
The captain was a former ALPA Master Chairman who got lifetime passes for first class travel. He was thrown out of office in disgrace by the pilots.
Ya ya the captain sounds like he's not in the best mood, although according to the Youtube comments, the controller did let him fly past the localizer course.
But more importantly - the elephant in the room everyone is too scared to touch with a 10 foot pole - what in the world is happening with that FO? How did he pass the English requirement? That's shockingly bad communication for a widebody pilot on a US major....
I disagree, Rob. Ben publishes plenty of stupid stuff, for clicks or otherwise. We don’t have to read them, just like no one has to read the stupid comments from a half a dozen of his most moronic followers.
This story was legitimate from every angle. ATC was acceptable enough. UA pilot is clearly a *ick and should be ashamed of himself. The FO seems to need a bit of remedial training.
The controller vectored him through the approach course then made a stupid comment. The captain was right for calling him out. The FO needs improvement
That's not even funny. They're probably not even Italian (or actually Italian-American which has nothing to do with real Italy).
@deltasax (or anyone who remembers OMAAT before the comment section turned into what it is today) — a quick PSA.
A few minutes with your LLM of choice is all it takes to vibe-code a client-side block script. The right tool is a browser userscript: it runs whenever a blog page loads and overwrites comments from anyone on a blocklist you maintain, locally, before you ever see them. On my end, the screeds, pleas for mommy's attention, and word graffiti from the usual suspects now just read "Clownhole comment removed."
Install Tampermonkey (Chrome/Edge/Safari) or Violentmonkey (Firefox), paste in the script, and that's it.
There are certain situations where information must be repeated exactly as stated. Major props, no pun intended, to the ATC for maintaining his cool with Captain Karen. As a fire dispatcher we had to recieve specific responses regarding downed power lines after a FC lost his life walking into one. I had a stand off of several mins w/an engine FC from another city within our area who refused to simply repeat "Engine 123 acknowledges power lines down." He kept saying "Copy" I kept stating "Engine 123 I need you to state verbatim 'Engine 123 acknowledges power lines down.' He tried to get me fired, my BC played the tapes for his BC, my voice stayed calm, never raised during this exchange. He got a written spanking, months later I was awarded dispatcher of the year. It wasn't an aircraft full of people, but both were life/safety issues, why be a jerk?
That reply is total idiocy..
Clowns get paid $50k per year and here you are being one for free.
Your reply is false libel. You are a coward and a liar (but you knew that already).
None of what you claim is true.
Atc is 100% wrong as are most of the responses on this thread. Clearly the cranky flyer also has no idea how to fly. 210k vector through the localizer at a huge intercept angle? Whats the turn raddius of a 787 at the speed ? A mile maybe?? ATC has killed a fair amount of people over the past few years. Crew did the right thing.
You have quite the imagination. UAL management should find who is posting this libel after clearly using company resources to look up the names of the crew.