Pakistani Airlines crew put off in CYYT

[Code Blue]

According to local news, 5 Pakistani Airlines flight crew were asked to leave a US flight in St John's. They were apparently en route to Miami for simulator training and had asked for aisle seats.

Subsequently AC also declined to take them. I guess they're still there :eek:

rgds
CB

[411A]

Hope they brought their longjohns...cold wx just around the corner.....

[Idunno]

411, it gets cold in Pakistan too.

On a serious note though...how does an airline (or pilot) just 'throw off' a group of people who haven't done anything 'wrong' besides come from Pakistan?

Surely there has to be more to this because if not they probably have a case to sue the airline.

[rustbucket732]

Hmmmm.....

That ***** (your words) remark is blatantly racist, and may seriously find you yourself in deep trouble by saying such, if this was reported you would certainly find a visit by the police to be on the cards. Thank god I don't fly with you. However you are a 1200TT wanabee, lets hope you stay that way.

[ 20 September 2001: Message edited by: rustbucket732 ]

[CR2]

Gives us all a bad name. Moderator!

[dv8]

They were apparently en route to Miami for simulator training and had asked for aisle seats.
Oh my God .....They must be terrorists then
Hang on I once asked for an aisle seat!

[Lucifer]

Hmmmmm, you are just one of those racist idots who would lead us all into WW3 against everyone who is of a Middle Eastern appearance. Don't taint them all with the same brush, as the nutters are a minority. The remainder are the same as you or I: normal, decent people. Your racist rantings are unwelcome. :mad:

[mach78]

Idunno
-the people who created this disaster were just passengers-up until they struck.

In these present extraordinary times,just about anything done in the name of flight safety is justifiable.In this case whether it was something that was said, together with the colour of their skins, then real suspicion may have been raised against this group

Unfortunately for many innocent people now, the colour of your skin WILL matter in future, and may induce closer scrutiny due to the origins of the people who created the outrage.

To talk of court action given the circumstances, is absurd in extremis

[Sensible]

We should all be very cautious about labelling all Moslems as terrorists. I know many Moslems personally including an Afghan who is now Chairman of a Mosque in the UK who was ordered out of Afghanistan by the Taliban for non-fundamentalist Moslem religious teachings. A more sincere honest pleasant individual and family man would be hard to find. On the other hand, I have employed two self confessed Islamic fundamentalists and have discussed their beliefs with them. Quite honestly, I found at the time of my discussion with them that their plans for world domination and formation of an Islamic state within the UK using force somewhat amusing. Not so now!

We must be very careful not to brand every Moslem as a madcap fundamentalist the same as many of us would be offended if all Christians were branded as Jehovah Witnesses for instance. The evil fundamentalists are a minority faction thank god! Let all faiths work together to eliminate/isolate evil terrorists. The alternative is to alienate Moslem and no doubt other religious groups into a Christians v the rest of the world scenario and be assured, that would be a most unwise move! The fact that these evil people happen to be Moslem is coincidental and we must not under any circumstances direct our anger at Molslem people on the basis that they are Moslem.

[penguin]

St. John's - The pilot of a Delta Airlines jet diverted to St. John's last week delayed leaving because of suspicions about five passengers. The men were pilots with Pakistan Airlines.

The president of the St. John's Airport Authority, Rex Ledrew, says the Delta pilot wanted them off his plane when he heard details about them.

They were travelling to Miami for flight simulator training. All of them had aisle seats, and a some didn't have checked luggage.

Ledrew says Canadian investigators found no evidence any of the men had terrorist connections.

He says the Delta pilot eventually allowed two of the men to continue their travel, but three were left in St. John's.

Ledrew says the Pakistani pilots were understandably upset with their treatment.

He says Canadian immigration authorities are dealing with the men who are still in St. John's.

[Airbubba]

I expect Jesse Jackson to take up the cause any moment now. In context it should be noted that the Times is not noted for its sympathetic treatment of Paks as it calls them.

____________________________________

From the Times of India

Racial profiling grounds Asians in US

CHIDANAND RAJGHATTA

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

WASHINGTON: Sporadic incidents of Arab and South Asian passengers being off-loaded from commercial airplanes are being reported amid fears of unofficial racial profiling in the US. The incidents are occurring despite efforts by authorities to calm tempers following the devastating terrorist attacks here last week.

Ashraf Khan, a 32-year-old Pakistani businessman was bumped off a Delta Airlines flight from San Antonio International Airport on Monday because the pilot and the crew did not feel "comfortable" flying with him on board. In another incident, three Middle-Eastern looking men were forced to disembark a flight from Minneapolis Airport after other passengers refused to allow the plane to take off with them.

The shocking incidents come at a time when the airline industry is already in trouble following a week-long shut down, with passengers load at an all time low because of the terrorist attack. Many minorities are said to have cancelled travel plans even ahead of the reported incidents.

Khan was seat-belted on Delta flight 1469 departing San Antonio to Dallas for an onward journey to Pakistan to attend his brother's wedding when the captain of the aircraft asked to see him in the aerobridge. The captain then asked him to disembark, saying the crew did not feel safe with him on board.

"I never saw in my dreams that this would be happening to me...He has no right to embarrass me or ask me like that," Khan told the San Antonio Express-News that reported the incident. "I feel I'm a person. The terrorist attack doesn't have anything to do with me."

Khan, who runs a cellular telephone business, was dressed in regulation slacks, dress shoes and a T-shirt.

Delta Airlines said it did not practice or endorse any form of racial profiling. Travel agents reportedly offered Khan alternative flights that he declined. Aviation authorities said the captain of the plane had wide-ranging authority once the aircraft was ready for take-off.

Several Sikhs across the country have also reported difficulty while commuting and travelling, despite a great deal of publicity in the national media to their travails. The term 'towel heads' is the reigning pejorative on Internet chat rooms for anyone wearing a turban.

But those with Arabic sounding names seem particularly prone to suspicion.

At Boston's Logan International Airport -- origin of two of the hijacked flights on September 11 --Arab-looking passengers were pulled off three separate flights last weekend alone, according to media reports. In each instance, the suspicions of flight crews were determined to be unwarranted and they were allowed to carry on.

The Bush administration has worked hard to disabuse the public of its unwarranted fears, including a visit to a Washington mosque by the President earlier this week, during which he praised Islam as a noble religion that preached peace.

But so great is the anger and fear among many Americans, including some in public positions, that they are letting the passions get the better of them.

In one instance a Republican Congressman from Louisiana told a network of radio stations that someone "wearing a diaper on his head" should "expect to be interrogated in the investigation of terrorist attack."

"If I see someone (who) comes in that's got a diaper on his head and a fan belt wrapped around the diaper on his head, that guy needs to be pulled over," Congressman John Cooksey said, in remarks that he has refused to withdraw despite protests from minority groups.

"When you've got a group of people who are not American citizens, who are of Arab descent and they were involved in killing 5,000 Americans. ... I think we can and should scrutinize people that fit that profile until this war on terrorism is over," Cooksey maintained.

One report said for many Arabs, such remarks are beginning to invoke the expression "Flying While Arab," a reminder of the African American complaint of being stopped for "Driving While Black."

[PETERJ]

Eh...so there I am lining up at the airbridge to board with my wife and two children and just in front of me are a group of 5 young Arabic speaking men obviously travelling as a group and with no signs of any wives or children travelling with tem . What do I think ?......I think hijacker group profile and I panic. Illogical ....maybe....... But no way is my family going on that flight. Airline Marketing people take note.

PeterJ

[birdsong]

GREAT : let them walk ;)

[birdsong]

A lot of people died in NY and DC. Thousands of children have no parents anymore.
The stock marked is rambling down like the twin towers did. 100.000 of good colleges are getting sacked in US and EU and they have children to support too. Stupid dumbf@cks are driving around in the streets with their Palestinian flags hanging out and yelling patronizing words against US and all other people who are not Muslims. How can anybody except, for half brain stupid socialistic politicians have sympathies for these people? If people from Pakistan travel 5 together and asks for aisle seats and they are aircrew they must be not to intelligent if they cant understand that they make them self’s suspicious after what happened in NY and DC. If all the Muslims around the world who are washing their hands right now in TV interviews and newspapers by telling how good people they are and how fine intentions they have would spend their time helping to catch Big lips laden and his terror regime around the world, Somebody would maybe believe them.
:eek:

[apple]

birdsong.... Grow up the U.S instigated this the people are fine its the cowboy government
that has the bad foreign policy

The U.S even killed their president

Why America?

You cannot surely believe everything you read in the media

You forget Vietnam

[Eboy]

In 1993, Jesse Jackson, an African-American civil rights advocate in the U.S., made this statement, “There is nothing more painful to me at this stage in my life than to walk down the street and hear footsteps and start thinking about robbery, then look around and see somebody white and feel relieved.”
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/nj/taylor2000-06-20 .htm (http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/nj/taylor2000-06-20.htm)

[ 21 September 2001: Message edited by: Eboy ]

[Airbubba]

Yep, Jesse is sure an expert on racial profiling after he called New York "Hymietown" back in 1984. Of course, as a "civil rights advocate" he couldn't be accused of racism...

Here's an account from the Washington Post:

Jesse Jackson's 'Hymietown' Remark – 1984

Rev. Jesse Jackson referred to Jews as "Hymies" and to New York City as "Hymietown" in January 1984 during a conversation with a black Washington Post reporter, Milton Coleman. Jackson had assumed the references would not be printed because of his racial bond with Coleman, but several weeks later Coleman permitted the slurs to be included far down in an article by another Post reporter on Jackson's rocky relations with American Jews.

A storm of protest erupted, and Jackson at first denied the remarks, then accused Jews of conspiring to defeat him. The Nation of Islam's radical leader Louis Farrakhan, an aggressive anti-Semite and old Jackson ally, made a difficult situation worse by threatening Coleman in a radio broadcast and issuing a public warning to Jews, made in Jackson's presence: "If you harm this brother [Jackson], it will be the last one you harm."

Finally, Jackson doused the fires in late February with an emotional speech admitting guilt and seeking atonement before national Jewish leaders in a Manchester, New Hampshire synagogue. Yet Jackson refused to denounce Farrakhan, and lingering, deeply rooted suspicions have led to an enduring split between Jackson and many Jews. The frenzy also heightened tensions between Jackson and the mostly white establishment press.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-s rv/politics/special/clinton/frenzy/jackson.htm (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/special/clinton/frenzy/jackson.htm)

[ 22 September 2001: Message edited by: Airbubba ]

[Dockjock]

For chrissakes, the US did not instigate the slaughter of innocent civilians! Regardless of any foreign policy they hold! Even after an attack of this magnitude, you bleeding heart liberals still don't get it- not everybody is your friend, and nor do they want to be. There are some BAD people in this world, and because of the fact that some of them are Muslim, unfortunately for their other innocent Muslim brothers the entire ethnicity is now under suspicion due to natural human anxieties.

Good god we're never going to catch these criminals if we don't start casting the net a bit wider. Sorry if this will sometimes snag some innocents, but it has to be done. Surely a few dozen people being taken off a handful of flights is better than bombing the entire middle east into oblivion? Wake up.

[NotMyJob]

apple - you're a nutcase

[lumbalund]

The Pakistani pilots were enroute from Newyork to miami for B737 simulator.They were offloaded because they were all carrying flight manuals ,training manuals and other documents which are required when one goes for conversion training. :cool:

[The Guvnor]

On the other hand, check out Final Call (http://www.finalcall.com/), the mouthpiece of that terribly nice chap Louis Farrakhan who, for some reason best known to himself, our beloved Home Secretary decided to allow into the UK recently despite a long ban for incitement to racial hatred.

[JT8]

If security want to make more detailed checks on Muslim travellers so be it. It is justified after what has happenned. However, being thrown off an aircraft because the Capt felt 'uncomfortable' is unjust. :mad:

Birdsong, nearly all muslims want Bin Laden to be found and handed over. There is no doubt about that. Your comment regarding proof by helping out is rather uneducated, as the problem is a little deeper than that.

Regards, JT8

[ 22 September 2001: Message edited by: JT8 ]

[salapilot]

Some of the postings are getting or are on the verge of racism. We must be all looking back and seeing if we trained with anyone Arabic or questioning passengers who don't look "normal" and having doubts about them... please stop this ,has we will be tarnishing everyone with the same brush.


Tim Mcveigh was the guy who bombed a building .... were all white men suddenly under suspicion of becoming terrorists...I don't think so.

Just think of the people who trained these sicko's and how they must be feeling . How in the hell must they have known. What has let them down is the CIA and FBI (Not to mention the sick Bas$%^ds who funded this act).

Please let's have sensible debates !

:mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:

[autoflight]

apple - wake up.

[ManaAdaSystem]

So now it's OK to offload any passengers with a different skin color? And if one gets on the flight anyway, he is likely to have 200 pairs of shoes hurled at him every time he goes to the loo. Because he wasn't chitchatting with the person next to him, and that (well almost) makes him a terrorist. The Captain said so, didn't he? Didn't he?

And meanwhile, in the cockpit, the flightcrew is busy shutting down the engines and pointing the nose of the aircraft straight into the ground. Terrorists trying to enter the cockpit! By God, they are not going to use my aircraft as a bomb!
Little do they know it's 82 year old Martha, who on her first flight has mistaken the cockpit door for the door to the restroom.

I realise the emotions involved, but can we all just lower our heartrates a little bit?

[NikeAir]

My god, there's been some crap with racist overtones written on this and many other bulletin boards over the past few days, but the narrow minded bigoted views of some the posts in this thread take the biscuit!

Ok, so on the basis that the IRA bomb London and else where in the UK, brands ALL Catholics as terrorists right?

So beware you rednecks, next time you venture into town for a nice ruby (curry to the yanks), watch out cos Ali in the kitchen, no doubt, will be lacing your Vindaloo sauce with arsenic!
:mad:

[Airbubba]

Yep, just to make sure there are no racist overtones, please review the profiles of the suspects:

http://www.boston.com/news/packages/underattack/news/hijackers_list.htm

[salapilot]

Airbubba.....what is your point...so what about their profiles ? it makes no difference to what they did or indeed the racist remarks being made on this thread !