Does Virgin Atlantic pass on concerns about welfare of deportees to Pilots?VS651

[araucaria]

Dear Professional Pilots - especially on Virgin Atlantic
I'm a law student working with a group that supports asylum seekers to obtain their rights to protection from persecution. We are helping a lady with a young child who are due to be removed against their will on Virgin Airlines VS651 from Heathrow at 22:10 today 3rd Feb. She and her child are in fear of grave harm if returned to Nigeria and for this reason she has asked for her name to be kept from a public campaign. We have obtained a visit to her from Medical Justice and a new lawyer and believe she has a good case that her travel on VS651 will be injurious to her and her daughter's health and that a new legal challenge is possible. However, it is possible she will be removed tonight before such a legal challenge can be lodged.

We know that a very large number of people have contacted Virgin Atlantic Customer Services and they are aware of the grave concerns of these people for the lady and her child's welfare and for that of other passengers who may witness her and her child's forcible detention on the aircraft. However, unlike some other airlines we cannot ascertain whether the Pilot or other crew of VS651 tonight are aware of this situation. We believe that if they are made aware they may want a chance to consider the welfare and human rights issues involved in this case. Can anyone help me to find out if this information has been circulated to the Pilot.

Any views on how commonly this information is shared with Pilots by their airlines would be of great interest too.

[750XL]

Wonder if these medical issues would arise if she had to take a flight to 'freedom' :ugh::rolleyes:

[Trinity 09L]

No doubt the case has been fully approved by a court of law in the UK prior to deportation going ahead, so are you seeking a Captain of the aircraft to overrule this decision and risk their career, and possibly be in breach of the order of a Court or the Secretary of State's decision.
How did the individual(s) arrive in this country, was it a lawful entry?

[Yellow Sun]

We believe that if they are made aware they may want a chance to consider the welfare and human rights issues involved in this case.

Please give your reasons as to why you believe that.

[DaveReidUK]

we cannot ascertain whether the Pilot or other crew of VS651 tonight are aware of this situationAre you seriously suggesting that the captain is going to be unaware that he/she has deportees on board ?

[Planemike]

DR..............

Think the OP was just seeking information.

[crewmeal]

The Commander of any aircraft will know details of any special passengers onboard regardless of who they are at a briefing. PNRs (Passenger names lists) are made available to the crew prior to departure.

We believe that if they are made aware they may want a chance to consider the welfare and human rights issues involved in this case.

Sadly you are wrong. Welfare, legal and human rights issues are the resonsibility of the authorities, not the carrier. Their job is to take them from A to B safely.

Any views on how commonly this information is shared with Pilots by their airlines would be of great interest too.

Crews will be made aware of the situation and seating will have been assigned to the passengers concerned. Crews are not above the law and cannot intervene in such cases.

[Torque Tonight]

I can tell you that in such situations we are completely satisfied that legal due process has been followed. Given how difficult it is to deport people from the UK (the various Abu's for example), we have little doubt that those who do get deported thoroughly deserve it and we are happy to play our small part in the operation of a just system. If there was a genuine medical reason why the individual was not medically fit to fly that might be an opportunity for the Captain to exercise his authority. As far as I can tell you are looking to 'pull a sickie' or ask the Captain to sabotage the process. That aint going to happen.

[MCDU2]

A 51 y/o law student?

[Phileas Fogg]

I'm a law student working with a group that supports asylum seekers to obtain their rights to protection from persecution. We are helping a lady with a young child who are due to be removed against their will on Virgin Airlines VS651 from Heathrow at 22:10 today 3rd Feb.

Did they have a nice flight?

[Rwy in Sight]

MCDU2,

maybe a mature student?

Is it funny that araucaria was registered here just for that single post requesting something completely out of tune with a company procedures?

[vctenderness]

In my experience deportees are handed over to the Senior Crew member who holds their documentation throughout the flight. They would only be informed of relevant information with regard to their well being during flight ie they are diabetic or require vegetarian etc.

The Captain is fully aware of their presence but no more information than necessary as above.

If they are believed to be liable to cause a problem with other passengers or crew they are escorted by an official of the immigration services.

[Wageslave]

In my experience the "anti deportation advisory/support groups" consist of a bunch of bunnyhugging anarchist idiots who will do anything to pervert the course of justice and, assisted by the compliance of the detention services (no doubt forced into compliance by equally disgracefully motivated lawyers). One of their techniques is to teach and coach the deportees into making such an exhibition of pure animal behaviour including spitting at other pax, screaming slogans continuously, fighting, yelling death threats and threatening physical assault on pax and crew and doing anything to achieve self harm that the crew feel forced to decline carriage for the sake of the other law abiding pax.
Then the year long cycle of renewed deportation courtcases wasting more £00,000s before the miscreants just do it again.

I too went down this road, I could not subject my pax to the fury, hate and threats of the thugs that needed nine guards to (barely) keep two of them at bay. The guard afterwards explained, to my shame, what was going on and how the pressure/support groups teach these tactics and how I had played right into their hands. I was sick to the core.

Do not be intimidated by these scum. If the legal system, which as we know is ludicrously shy of deporting the vilest of these criminals has finally done its job for once do not, please do not, as crew, play into their hands at the thought of fighting animals in your cabin. I was assured that once the doors are shut and they realise the game is up they shut right up.

Sorry. Rant over. We have a responsibility to assist these people back to where they belong, and not play into the hands of their dreadlocked anarchist rentathug friends...

[Trinity 09L]

Araucuria
Any update? a successful deportation, a successful last ditch legal win, or did the crew agree to your request?

[Evanelpus]

I can tell you that in such situations we are completely satisfied that legal due process has been followed. Given how difficult it is to deport people from the UK (the various Abu's for example), we have little doubt that those who do get deported thoroughly deserve it and we are happy to play our small part in the operation of a just system. If there was a genuine medical reason why the individual was not medically fit to fly that might be an opportunity for the Captain to exercise his authority. As far as I can tell you are looking to 'pull a sickie' or ask the Captain to sabotage the process. That aint going to happen.

Amen to that!:D

[PPL Hobbyist]

I was just wondering, how many of you airline pilots actually look at the passenger manifest that you get? What information about the passengers does it contain besides number of passengers on board?

[Tu.114]

We are certainly notified about anything or anybody nonstandard that we are requested to take along. This includes, but is not limited to, dangerous goods, medical cases, inadmissible passengers rejected by border control, and the here mentioned deportees.

A certain dislike of avoidable surprises is present in most crewmembers, so this information will be duly noted and be talked about as part of the preflight crew briefing.

Apart from this - allow me to third what Torque Tonight has written. It is not up to crew to second guess an enforceable judicial decision. There are many legal options available to challenge a court order; none of those involve flight crew.

[PPL Hobbyist]

Greetings TU 114.

I am absolutely in agreement with you, Torque Tonight and the other pilots who have said the same. I was just curious about how many pilots actually read through a list with 100 + passengers on it. I have no doubt however that you DO at least look at the bottom line (Souls on board and “Special” passengers), if I may put it that way.

I was also curious about what passenger information a passenger manifest contains. Name, seat number, age, country of origin? Other information?

[Laarbruch72]

The manifest can differ of course by location and agent but they generally contain name, booking number, seat allocation, and a column for any special info. Special info might be a pre booked treat for a celebrating passenger (chocolates etc), or it could say deportee or escort, or whatever the company wants it to convey but it's quite a small column, maybe enough room for 5-10 words. That's all the crew see. There's no information on country of origin or age, and certainly not anything around reasons for a particular status.

[thing]

Someone very close to me is part of the decision process as to whether these people get deported or not. They have already had to jump through a million hoops to even get to the decision process so be assured that if they are being bunged onto an a/c that the action is fully justified. All of the evidence is taken into account, all humanitarian aspects are taken into account, regardless of how some members of the legal profession and media would like to portray it.

[vctenderness]

Slight thread creep but I watched an episode of UK Borders on Sky yesterday. They had picked up a Nigerian man with a forged passport and were interviewing him.

He claimed to be 15 years old bit was obviously 30-35 years old. He had a list of questions and answers written down which he said was given to him in Lagos by "Mr London" these, of course were lies to enable him entry to UK.

He said he was a student but gave a totally wrong year for when his study started and could not name his college.

When they said he would be refused entry he suddenly started wailing and saying he could not go back to Nigeria as his parents had been murdered by burglars and he would be killed.

The half wit Border agent suggested Asylum and then confirmed this with her superior they said , as he was 15, he would be handed over to Social Services.

The voice over then said he had been housed in Croydon while he was being checked out but had absconded and his whereabouts are unknown!

I just cannot believe this goes on surely false passport, Nigerian man pretending to be a child straight back same day end of!

[Cymmon]

Maybe just employed as a cleaner by a government minister? :)

[PPL Hobbyist]

Greetings Cymmon,

I have seen the video you are talking about on Youtube, and many more.
Nigerian Man Caught With Fake Passport Documents At Uk Airport - YouTube

Are we stepping off topic now? I don't think so. I think that we are talking about why the big flying bus drivers in the air should fly any deportee back to where they came from..

About 5 years ago when I flew to England (Terminal 1, Heathrow), I sat waiting for the line at the immigration counter to get shorter before I checked in. Behind me I heard an argument. I turned around to see a man with numerous women with him (I assume he was married to them all). The immigration officer had just come out with some paper work that was required for them to enter England.

The man then started complaining to the immigration officer how bad their service was and how slow they were and so on. The immigration officer promptly tore up all their paper work. He said, “I have worked though my tea time to get you in, and this is the gratitude I get?”. Him and his anchorage were no doubt marched off to some place in the airport where they would wait for a plane back to wherever they came from.

We are not idiots. We can see that the man in this video is lying through his teeth about everything including his age, and he had a false passport. He subsequently disappeared after they gave him a place to stay while they investigate his case. What havoc and crime is he committing in England now? We will never know.

IMHO, they should have sent him right back to Nigeria.

[Cymmon]

Hi,
It actually wasn't me that mentioned the video, but I have seen it before.

I agree, it should be straight back to whence you came, but unfortunately due to the British sticking to the letter of the law (unlike other Europeans) we will continue to accept these people.

On an offside, my Philippino girlfriend was allowed a 6 month visa to stay in the UK. I applied to the Spanish so she could visit Lanzarote with me. Bearing in mind she had entry and exit limits on her Uk visa, the Spanish made us book flights to and from Lanzarote and prove that we had money to cover the cost and also accommodation. All done, easy!!!
No, they refused her access!!! She came to the Uk, I lost my money for the visit to Spain, but she left the Uk well within the time on her visa.

Again,is England too easy on people?

[PPL Hobbyist]

I humbly appologise, Cymmon. I meant to reference vctenderness.

[KelvinD]

Some years ago, a few years before the Schengen agreement came in, while living and working in Germany, I had a project running in Lisbon. Frequently, I would drive down there. One day, thought I would take my wife and son as I was going to be there for 5 to 6 weeks. The wife being Filipina, needed visas so first I obtained the Portuguese one for her and she then applied for the Spanish visa. It was only a day or so before setting off that I noticed her Spanish visa was for a single entry only. This was not going to work as, in order to drive anywhere from Portugal, you need to enter Spain from France on the way out and re-enter Spain on the way back. So, we drove there with no problem. Didn't bother with the Portuguese border officials crossing from Spain into Portugal; I just gave them a cheery wave. When it was time to return, I chose to leave Portugal via a very quiet border post I had sussed out. We stopped in a cafe about 100 yards from the border post and had a nice lunch while sitting on the cafe terrace. As expected, at lunch time all the Spanish officials disappeared inside their post for lunch. We all jumped in the car and went "wheee" right through a virtually abandoned border! The Spanish consulate in Frankfurt knew we were driving as that was stated on the visa application but were not smart enough to figure out how one could do the round trip with only a single entry!

[Wannabe Flyer]

The Spanish consulate in Frankfurt knew we were driving as that was stated on the visa application but were not smart enough to figure out how one could do the round trip with only a single entry!

Err... did you check Multiple entry on the application form and pay the fee?

UK should start the Border control Checks at the home country like the USA. Helps airborne illegals from entering at home base. Once on UK soil unfortunately all sorts of EU rules and regulations start applying. Probably the reason why the aussies intercept and hold them outside their territory :ok: