Passenger forced to stand throughout 7 hour flight

[acbus1]

Post out of sequence due Proon gremlins: should be Post #6

They should've asked the fat man to sing.

That way, it'd all have been over.

[cyflyer]

Poor guy, I wonder how he managed to eat his meal ? Probably got admonished for obstructing the aisle also.


(incidentally, this is post number 6, dunno what its doing up here. Maybe there is fat man at the bottom and squeezed up here !)

[JEM60]

My wife and I were once separated seat-wise on a Virgin Trans Atlantic flight, and she was informed that she could use the FA seat [opposite me] at any time during the flight other than take-off or landing.

[DB6]

Bollocks. Read the article and it sounds very much like it's just another grasping, contemptible little man angling for as much as he can screw out of an airline.

[MarkerInbound]

(I have no idea what post number this will up as.)

Simple answer, place an overwing exit trainer on the jet bridge and a sign, "Please step through this exit hatch to confirm you can safely exit the aircraft in an emergency."

[cyflyer]

A fat man is splayed across both seats, leaving no room for the poor squeezed out passenger, and is forced to stand throughout the entire US Airways 7 hour flight. But, as passengers are not permitted to sit in the flight attendants' jump seats the cc did not improvise and allow the poor fellow to sit in a jump seat. What an absurd situation. He should sue the pants off them.
A travel nightmare: Man stands throughout 7-hour flight - CNN.com (http://edition.cnn.com/2011/11/25/travel/passenger-of-size/index.html?hpt=hp_t3)

[golfyankeesierra]

the cc did not improvise and allow the poor fellow to sit in a jump seat. What an absurd situation.
And where is the FA going to sit when they encounter turbulence?

[AAIGUY]

There are more cc seats than crew generally.
Certainly on USair which isnt known for service.
They'd have minimum legal cabin crew

[kotakota]

Ridiculous , most airlines are now being very tough about the dimensions of cabin baggage , why not about size relative to seat purchased ? All this PC BS is dangerous - I suppose said large passenger was also entered on load sheet as 80 kgs ?

[Noxegon]

I personally feel that airlines should operate a combined weight allowance for passenger and luggage :)

[Basil]

I do not believe the captain could not have used his command discretion and told the SCC to seat the passenger in a crew seat for cruise and, if a spare was available, also for landing.

Some airlines have policies in place to handle issues with "passengers or customers of size."
D'you mean 'grossly overweight?

[bingofuel]

If, as he claims, he was unable to fasten his seat belt, how could cc report cabin secure before take off?

[KAG]

"His size required both armrests to be raised up and allowed for his body to cover half of my seat," Berkowitz said.

Why should we allow somebody that doesn't fit to take off? NO WAY.

Further more, if one passenger cannot fasten his seatbelt, it was the case, the airplane shouldn't even taxi, but take off?

The fat guy is guilty and dishonest. Dishonest because he didn't pay for 2 seats or first class. Guilty because he should take some time in Somalia to understand eating is not only a game.

US airways is guilty, they should have never took off in this situation.

Make the fat fellow to pay $1000 to the unlucky passenger, and make US airways to pay $10000, plus a fine for breaking the FAA rules.

[HEATHROW DIRECTOR]

I think the Captain should have exercised his authority and chucked off the fatso..

[Piltdown Man]

My company will not fly people whose dimensions mean that they encroach on space they haven't paid for (unless the adjacent seat is free). If you are 'two seats large" and you need to fly, you buy two seats. That is a reasonable policy.

[EEngr]

"His size required both armrests to be raised up and allowed for his body to cover half of my seat," Berkowitz said.
I paid for the armrest as well. It stays down.

Furthermore, let fatso stand up for 7 hours. Wait until he goes to the can, sit down, drop the armrest and let him whine.

[Dream Land]

Which proves again that no problem that begins before pushback ever resolves itself after takeoff, if this passenger didn't alert the crew before departure, he deserved to stand. :ugh:

[cyflyer]

He initially had an empty seat next to him on Flight 901, but a late passenger sat there and took more space than he paid for.

That meant that, though he did manage to wedge himself into his seat for the takeoff and landing, he was unable to comply with the requirement that his seat belt be fastened at those times

Dreamland it seems that the cc didn't do their job properly when they didn't ensure that his seatbelt was fastened.

[Dream Land]

Well I think a qualified cabin crew might have a different opinion, they can't be everywhere at once, especially with the chaos just prior to pushback, most passengers of average intelligence will either stand up or raise their hand, either way, the cabin crew would have sorted this out.

[RevMan2]

This is a classic case of passing the buck to the nth degree.

Let's assume that the overweight pax checked in online, that he only had hand luggage and that his first encounter with a human was at the time of boarding.

The boarding agent - knowing that the flight was full - should have checked for 2 boarding passes for adjacent seats and the FA at the door - knowing that the flight was full - should have checked for 2 boarding passes for adjacent seats.

The airline then absolves itself of all responsibility and allows the situation to drift down to a conflict between 2 passengers, one of whom is significantly disadvantaged by the airline's negligence and is then fobbed off with the offer of a pittance of compensation.

Don't blame the morbidly obese pax ....er... passenger of size for only being charged for 1 seat - that was the airline's decision - and don't blame his neighbour for not kicking up a fuss - people in the USA have made the acquaintance of PC Plod for a lot less.

[deep_south]

I guess this should have stopped before departure - during the announcement of "tray tables up & arm rests down" - isn't that a standard announcement?

I remember a flight a few years ago where "a person of size" was next to me, and he said "we don't need this down, do we" and tried to lift up the arm rest - quickly followed by me saying "actually, yes we do" - which at least helped to contain him in what then became quite a restrictive area - but at least there wasn't too much "roll over".

As has been said, this was wrong at so many levels. And the cabin crew should have picked this up at their pre-departure walk through - no excuses for that, and to me that does make the airline responsible. That is when it should have been sorted.

[radeng]

If the PAX pays for two seats, does he (or she) get double the FF miles?

[SeenItAll]

If the PAX pays for two seats, does he (or she) get double the FF miles?

This is actually a question that I have never found a satisfactory answer to. In my case, it was with respect to purchasing two extra economy seats so that I could lie down across three seats and sleep on a long flight (far cheaper than paying extortionate business class rates). While I was able to determine that the extra seats should be booked under the name of Mr. Extra Comfort Seat. It appears that no airline would provide me with FF miles for my account for these seats. Thus, they would effectively cost me more than my own seat. (I do not know whether I could open a FF account under the name of Mr. Extra Comfort Seat.)

Does anyone have a different experience?