My goodness, talk about misdirected anger…
In this post:
Airline passenger attacks pilot due to delay
Indian aviation is having a really rough few days due to fog, with Delhi Airport seeing hundreds of flight cancelations and delays due to weather. While this can obviously lead to frustration among passengers, one traveler took things way too far.
This incident happened on Sunday, January 14, 2024, on IndiGo flight 6E2175 from Delhi (DEL) to Goa (GOI). The flight was operated by a two-year-old Airbus A320neo with the registration code VT-ISV. While the flight was scheduled to depart at 7:40AM, the flight ended up being delayed by over 10 hours, all the way to 6PM, due to weather conditions. Obviously that’s an incredibly frustrating delay for all passengers onboard.
By the afternoon, the initial crew had timed out due to limits on the number of hours they can work, so a new crew took over. One of the new pilots was trying to make an announcement to passengers with an update about an additional delay, at which point a passenger ran up from the back of the cabin and physically assaulted him.
IndiGo is deciding what to do with the passenger?!
The passenger who punched the pilot ended up being removed from the aircraft. The pilot filed a complaint against him, so the traveler was taken into police custody. It remains to be seen what kind of legal punishment he’ll face.
An IndiGo official stated the following:
“We have established an internal committee, and the incident has been referred to it. The committee will determine appropriate action against the passenger, including the possibility of placing him on the ‘No Fly List’ under the unruly behaviour category.”
The airline is establishing a committee to decide if it’s appropriate to place this guy on the company’s no fly list?! Like, is there any question of whether this guy would be placed on the no fly list? If this incident doesn’t qualify, then what does?
I suppose this is probably just a standard process that the airline goes through when deciding whether to ban someone or not, but I think there should be no question here.
Bottom line
India is currently seeing quite some operational disruptions in aviation, which is of course frustrating for passengers. However, assaulting a pilot who is keeping passengers informed is never appropriate, though that’s exactly what one traveler on an IndiGo flight did yesterday. The airline is now considering adding him to the no fly list, which should be the obvious course of action.
What do you make of this IndiGo situation?
I mean it is India. A lot needs to change.
I also would have offloaded the pax. That is a long delay.
Both have fault with the passenger having 90% of the blame. The company had 10%
Sucks for the pilot.
What a feral monkey.
Agree with the other comment. The action from the passenger is not right but there is more to the story.
Either it was an increadible reaction by the flight attendant to pull the trolley between the crew and the attacker or they did expect something like this to happen?
There is more to the story supposedly.
The pilot in question was lecturing the passengers how they were asking too many questions and that caused them to miss their departure slot. That statement was what set the passenger off and got him upset enough to physically assault the crew.
Furthermore, this passenger had supposedly been on the aircraft for over 4 hours (and a further 5+ hours at the airport) and had been requesting to...
There is more to the story supposedly.
The pilot in question was lecturing the passengers how they were asking too many questions and that caused them to miss their departure slot. That statement was what set the passenger off and got him upset enough to physically assault the crew.
Furthermore, this passenger had supposedly been on the aircraft for over 4 hours (and a further 5+ hours at the airport) and had been requesting to disembark but was constantly being refused. So he stated after the fact that this was the only way for him to be removed from the aircraft.
Never an excuse for violence, but also poor passenger handling by Indigo judging by this story and the dozens of similar (yet non-violent) incidents that occured over their network yesterday.
Back in the days of ModiLuft — definitely in Q1 and probably that of Q1 1996 , I got stuck for hours on a plane at DEL — when flying to BLR — after hours long delays to board the plane. Lots of fog-related delays and unhappy passengers but no one took it out on the airline cockpit and cabin crews. Unfortunately, in the time since then, way more Indian passengers have become far more...
Back in the days of ModiLuft — definitely in Q1 and probably that of Q1 1996 , I got stuck for hours on a plane at DEL — when flying to BLR — after hours long delays to board the plane. Lots of fog-related delays and unhappy passengers but no one took it out on the airline cockpit and cabin crews. Unfortunately, in the time since then, way more Indian passengers have become far more coarse and physically aggressive and India has been the precursor of what kind of drama we have been getting out of Florida and with Spirit in the last couple of years.
Sounds to me like he could just have stayed in the front and demanded to be let off the plane. If he ignored all requests to be calm and sit down he would have been removed as well but without assault charge and maybe even without no-fly list entry.
@ Sean M. -- Interesting, thanks for the heads up on that! Is this written about anywhere? Haven't seen that, so would be curious to add those details to post. Thanks!
Yes it is, a Russian passenger who was also on the same flight to Goa gave the interview.
Well he was delayed, lectured to like everyone else. Nobody else lost control soooo.
How can he slap??
Entitled Passenger ?
He’s as lovely as the IRS agent Jim, who wants me to settle my tax debts via gift cards.
It’s fog season at DEL airports in December to February, more so at some hours of the day than others. Layer on the massive smog problem and it has an impact on operations and has long been a seasonal problem. The drama maker with the Indigo flight got hit by the nature of DEL and their own ignorance.