I am sure that these girls on board have seen more than their fare share of tackle, yet pretend they are virgins from Mecca.

Facts of life and unfortunate as it maybe another tick in the box as far as these guys go, my view is that it will not end here.

To be continued....

Regardless of the "virtuous" lifestyle of the crew or not, the fact is these passengers allegedly refused safety instructions from the crew, exposed themselves to the crew and others etc etc...so why are we diverting attention away from the alleged facts of the case and making disparaging remarks about the crew, and the country in general.....

Some facts are worth noting
 

saddlebrooks :confused:

"EY has as much control over the AUH police as BA has over the UK police".

With all due respect, you are either new to the region (not virgin from Mecca) or you are not aware of the culture in AUH. Just like AirNoServicesAustralia said EY owners own the police as well, it is true. Find out who Dr Sheikh Ahmad is???

As for the question Who charged them with consuming alcohol without a license? The police or EY? the question should be why are they charged with drinking alcohol with out a licence instead of threatening and endangering the safety of the aircraft????
I hope for your sake you do not have an accident where you are sitting at the traffic light minding your own business waiting for the traffic light to change and someone bangs into you. He gets hospitilised out of his own stupidity. Why? Because for as long as he is in hospital you are in jail and that is no joke I guarantee you (this is the law in the UAE), and I am speaking from experience. And if you do not have WASTA well you are in the Slammer until he comes out. Oh, did I mention that your family or wife will have no clue as to your whereabouts until only few days later??
I really do not want to bore you with all this human rights issues that we take for granted in the civilised world.:ok:

Happy and safe flying to all

Ironbutt, you never cease to amaze me with your ability to state the obvious and keep repeating adnauseum.

While safety is paramount it is not the tool to justify the authority of the crew over passengers, if it is then welcome to Syrian airlines or Iraqi airways, I doubt this is the image EY wants to project.

The manner in which crew brief passengers is of utmost importance and will in fact determine how passengers will interact with the crew, it is not because the crew lost their credibility with the passengers that they suddenly remember that they can nail them now using safety because it seems practical.

Throwing the book wont get you in their better books!

And remember it's a people's business! Not a police state.

Those Aussies are f@#$wits!!! And they have a f&^%wit lawyer too!!!

Lawyer: "Your Honor, my client wants to sue the airline. They maliciously prosecuted my clients!"

Judge: "The airline brought criminal charges against your clients?"

Lawyer: "Yes Your Honor. They also put them in a jail for a month and only gave them camels to eat!"

Judge: "The airline put them in jail?"

Lawyer: "Yes Your Honor. And the biggest crime was that my client were served warm champagne!"

Judge: "Yes, you have a case. We need to show those "less fortunate" people that they shouldn't mess with us. In fact, you win!"

Get over it guys. Governments deal with criminals in any way they see fit. Not all governments are angels but the Aussies are going to have a hard time convincing the courts that the airline had such overwhelming control over the government that the government was obliged to listen to them.

If the government could "assist" Etihad in this manner, what would stop them from "assisting" any other airline that was facing the same predicament? Being thrown in jail awaiting trail is nothing new, too bad for the guys it was summer.

Perhaps the rocket scientists among us who know UAE aviation law can answer this. Is it actually against the UAE law to threaten the safety of an aircraft? Sounds obvious but I know the law against smoking on an a/c has been sitting in some in-tray for years now. This might explain the charges that were made against the trio.

Smooze sailor, the legal action against EY would have more to do with damage control by the three than getting "justice". If they went back to Oz and did nothing they would look very guilty. I would think there will be a lot of noise but in the end nothing will come of it...except unwanted PR.

And that is exactly the point I was trying to make!

Well said!FSM

concerned
 

Hello Everyone:

I’ve been following the discussion on this thread and while I don’t want to comment on the actual incident that is being discussed, I did want to sound off on something I noticed in some of the posts and that is, a rather disturbing tendency to label people based on their nationality. Stereotypes, you see, are just never fair at all no matter how much “truth” they may be rooted-in, and no matter how prevalent they may be, because there will always be a diversity in attitudes, thoughts, etc. within people who are otherwise united by certain nationality. Therefore, a stereotype would never do justice to the minority (or majority) who may not fit in it. No matter how tempting it might be to think otherwise, a person’s nationality or status should never be a factor by which this person’s attitudes or mentalities are measured. You can get all kinds of mentalities or attitudes within any given nationality, it something strictly individual.

Of course, in the end of the day I believe in people’s freedom to have their own opinions, but I have always enjoyed Pprune as a forum for those of us in the industry to share thoughts and knowledge in an environment of openness, empathy and professionalism, and I hate to see such a beautiful thing be tainted by what may be unfair or biased rhetoric. After all Pprune is what we as users make it.

Just my 2 cents…

Guys,

First I knew of the whole thing came from watching Ozzie news while recovering from an overnight from s/e asia.

From my perspective the point of the whole thing, totally disregarding who did what to whom, who said what to which and what was ingested/digested or regurgitated, is what the consequences will be for EY.

As impartial as I can be to the situation, I can say with authority after spending the last couple of days here in godzone, watching the entire HUGE media blowup, talking to friends etc: that EY has done themselves and the UAE a lot of damage with the Australian people!

Spin doctors in please! And not just from EY. This may impact all the regions carriers.

Because EY never pressed any charges against the 3 I would imagine.

You are all talking about how much the UAE lives in hypocrisy and then you imply the chairman could have put his foot down to stop it :ugh: and/or he controls the police.

Yes I am sure he ordered the police to charge these 3 with drinking without a license.

...and desecrating one of his girlfriends' reputation or the lack thereof...:E

confused
 

:confused:
saddlebrooks, "Because EY never pressed any charges against the 3 I would imagine".

Iam sorry but Im just a little confused, How did these three men end up in police custody if nobody from EY complained to the police about them?? also somebody from EY would have been present in court to backup these charges I would imagine.otherwise how would the police know what to charge them with or what they did??

Happy and safe flying to all :ok:

Police and/or security attend to nearly half of disruptive passenger incidents, often the crew and/or airline is not notified if further action is taken by the authorities.

When a Capt. requests police/security assistance upon landing he is not placing charges against the accused of anything, the Capt. is only requesting assistance with a disruptive passenger.

This practice is not exclusive to the UAE it is in reality fairly standard worldwide.

At the end of the day I think this incident will serve as a message to most westerners to think long and hard about the way they act in and around the Middle East.

I have been travelling from Oz to the UAE for several years now and have watched the progressive decline in respect for the local culture and law - it was only a matter of time before something like this went over the top.

As far as the liquor laws go - they are unfortunately 'fluid'. The law might say you cannot drink at a hotel unless you are a guest but we all know that is garbage. Indeed, at the Airport Expo in DXB last week there was more beer and champagne flowing than at the Melbourne Cup, without any bother.

The UAE is now becoming the 'flavour of the month' for westerners as it is now seen as accessible and the 'cool' place to visit. Unfortunately, many westerners are more interested in whether it's a 'safe' place or not. Once they know it is, they just barge n in without any due diligence. On my visit last week, I took it upon myself to caution a lovely young Aussie girl that her shorts were, well, SHORT and she would be well advised to put something on before venturing out into the streets unless she wanted to get abused or spat at (it still happens).

The message is simple - Be careful, know and respect the law, and show respect for the locals and their culture. I always do and it's never got me into any trouble.

Dave...
 

On the same note, the investment and marketing product this region is trying to push is aimed directly at overseas cultures. The fact is, a place like Dubai has realized early that 6-10% of its GDP in oil production will not sustain its future, so they must diversify...and it is being done!

Based on this, they have to play our game...sorry simple as that. Take the good with the bad, that is business.

No more Mr. Nice Guy....this is all part of the global economics. Why do you think the IMF and the WTO are having so much grief here, the locals are trying to enjoy the best of both worlds. It simply won't work...this is 2007. :cool:

Stu
 

Stu, I accept and respect your point of view but these guys don't have to and shouldn't have to accept anything that disrespects anyone's fundamental beliefs - even in the name of business.

But Dave as Fox said (this is PPRUNE so I don't know who this Stu is :=) if you want the fire you will have to put up with the smoke. If you want the tourists as Abu Dhabi and especially Dubai want, then you need to provide them access to alcohol. If you provide them access to alcohol don't be surprised if some over indulge. I will say again to those that obviously can't read that I don't condone for a moment the way these guys acted. I just worry about the precedent set by charging these guys with drinking without a license when they are not residents and so could never possess a license.

Dave I do agree with the lack of respect for local values here, as evidenced by the abundance of mini skirts and cleavage every time I visit the malls in Dubai. It's so disgusting I have to revisit at least weekly to confirm for myself this disgusting practice is continuing :E But seriously it is a problem when you even see a local girl with the face fully covered but the Abaya open down the front revealing a spectacular lacy black bra number and some pretty impressive cleavage, at the local Starbucks :eek:

I think the UAE is confused itself on who it wants to be. It ideally wants to stay traditional in its culture and behaviour, but needs the foreign investment to help it diversify away from reliance on oil income, and with the foreign investment comes some of the problems from the West, ie. Drunkeness, crime etc. They either choose to shut the place off and become another Saudi Arabia or Kuwait, or take the bad with the good and try and make the best of it. If they do the latter then they need to at least get some consistency in their laws and realise that if you allow drinking you allow what comes from that drinking (to a reasonable degree, as has been pointed out absolute drunkeness is a crime everywhere not just here). The days of letting a man drink and then arresting him for having booze on his breath are gone. The days of defining drink driving as having any alcohol in someones system is gone, bring in .05.

I was just going to say 'Agreed' but apparently a comment of less than 10 characters is not allowed.

bluesfan
Your contributions, on this and on other threads, are very welcome. If only more locals would share your views, such incidents would hardly happen no more.
Biased views are omnipresent, but they get consolidated when enduring biased treatment or blatantly transparent double standards. The sad truth in this region is, that the local population seems to uphold this and find it absolutely justified. Although the same people when traveling or doing business abroad cry very distinctly for equal treatment. If the shameful actors had been locals, do you think they would have spent only one moment in jail? As a player on the international scene, you have to adopt international values. I acknowledge this might be a rubber standard, but most of the civilized world works just fine with that. In the USA they established biased rules to enhance national security. Such discrimination gets bashed all around the world, and rightfully so. Now another region gets bashed for some other biased treatment, rightfully again. Slowly established “soft rules” around the world do not accept unruly behavior on board of airlines. They however accept drinking alcohol. If this is not to be tolerated in some parts of the world, so be it, but then accept that they do not deserve to be considered part of the civilized international community and that the media will pick this up just as they pick up the dismal US immigration attitude.
If you want to eliminate prejudice and stigmatisms, the easiest way is to treat everybody the same, apply the same rules, standards and contracts to everyone.
Not only for passengers, but for employees as well.

ANSA - well put, have to agree with you.
This sort of realization - that the world will not play by your rules, but that you have to play by their rules, is what is known as 'growing up'.
Unfortunately, if my kids were anything to judge it by, adolescence is a messy, tantrum filled, stressful business.
If you choose to live in a country governed by angst-ridden adolescents, then you better learn patience.:cool:

The Local culture
 

Must agree with the majority of your posts and add that the problems with the local culture are manifold.

Firstly, thier children are segregated from the Intenational culture on day1, they are taught that Sheikh Zayed was the best leader the world has had, Sheikh Mohammed is a sun of a gun of a leader and a poet, before that there was nothing, later you could be something, but this is what you need to do: Follow the leader and not the foreigner.

Second: According to Mr. AL Tayer, minister of labour and such, Locals do not need training in administration because they are meant to take up management positions.....According to him, they do not need to work shift times either. We should really contact Harvard business school, Yale, Duke and all, and tell them that their curriculum is no longer required because Mr. Al Tayer has just found the solution to the world's administrative problems.

Third: If you want me to respect your daughter/wife/sister, then respect mine, and don't tailgate them; because if if I did that, you would have me sent to jail without going through go and giving you or your sister for that matter my 2pence worth.

Fourth: If you want tourism in order to diversify your market economy, then comply with what that market requires, you cannot expect someone to come and buy property here when you promise them they can get everything they need in terms of modern lifestyle and then impose on them Sharia law. Tourism is the biggest plague the world has known, it has transformed countries into hell holes so don't expect to come out of your tourism experience as if nothing had changed. From the paragliding to the Cyclone and york hotel (That funnily belong to local sheikhs) everything will change, including your daughter one day going out with a foreigner who happens to be better educated and treats her better than her cousin, who thinks his wasta can get him shisha for free.

And you won't have to worry about inbreading.......

Dave the Snail................

Sorry, but the 'problem' isn't confined to the Middle East I'm afraid.

See some PPRuNe posts on the air rage 'phenomenon' that were posted in 2001 at:

http://www.pprune.org/forums/showthread.php?t=1904

The classic outcome (result?) of the problem has to be infamous case of Gerald Finneran who took a crap on the drink cart in first class, then proceeded to clean himself-up (literally) with serviettes in front of the amazed onlookers. Finneran got 'rewarded' for his rather bizarre behaviour with a US$30K fine for his little 'indiscretion' by the way.

Fine, first class with all its supposed trimmings are probably an absolute nightmare for FAs who have to work in that environment with people who think it's their right to behave exactly as they want, when they want, and how they want (but wouldn't ever dream of acting so in their own homes in front of their families), but the simple answer really is to limit the amount of booze that these clowns seem to think they need during the flight.........and if they don't like the conditions applied by any airline in this respect, then stiff sh1t.............let 'em vote with their feet and choose another that's silly enought to let it happen! :ugh:

Might as well close up the Marketing department and stop developping products, and while we are at it, hire policemen to man the cabin...

Sorry mate Stiff **** or not that is not solving the problem.

Cheers

As impartial as I can be to the situation, I can say with authority after spending the last couple of days here in godzone, watching the entire HUGE media blowup, talking to friends etc: that EY has done themselves and the UAE a lot of damage with the Australian people!

I agree with Ennui, the colatteral damage from this, regardless of what is right or wrong, will be a PR nightmare for EY. Act in haste,repent in liesure. The silent majority of Australians talk with their actions, rather than their comments. Is EY paying it's senior management staff enough to circumvent this sort of awkward plublicity?

So let the Aus silent majority do their thing and realize that if you break the law on an airplane, you might not have a happy ending...if they behaved this way on any US carrier the same result would be forthcoming...anybody here on this forum who tries to minimize their behaviour by slagging off local customs, or the nationality of the crew, then I can only hope one of your fellow passengers behaves this way on your flight someday and see how you feel when you and your family are exposed to such misbehaviour...good day and good luck:ok:

Ironbutt you are still not getting the point mate, EY should have prosecuted then with evidence which it happens they did not have....


The result is bad publicity and it all stems from not the actions of the passengers that every airline should prepare itself for but EY didn't.

With any other major airline the crew work to prevent these situations from arising in this case I fear they made it worse.

The crew call the police with a disturbance the POLICE sort it out...wasnt aware EY or any other airline had the authority to prosecute... that comes as an unhappy suprise, but in any event there MUST have been some rational reason these pax were reported by the crew..in any event the comments about the crews nationality and possible personal behavioural tendencies have nothing to do with it anyway so those remarks are unwarranted and a bit un called for right??? If the nationalities of the crew and pax in this incident were reversed, I dont think all the criticisms on this thread would be posted do you??? "Nuff said gdday matey:ugh:

Actually the flight deck crew was western and the passengers in question were behaving outside of any acceptable norm. They were warned by the captain who they disregarded so the authorities were called to meet the aircraft on arrival. No different to any unrully pax incident into JFK or LHR.

Oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear :ugh:

evokes the response:

and

ummm.............exactly what part of risk management DON'T you understand Mustapha Rex? Simply, availability of unlimited booze = likelihood of passengers getting pissed (likely) = bad passenger behaviour consequences (moderate). So, using classic risk management logic, you have HIGH RISK of passenger rage.

Thus...............and pardon me if I'm wrong.............isn't that EXACTLY the [likely] 'actions of passengers' that an airline SHOULD prepare itself for??????:eek:

Ironbutt's right.................

And so the SIMPLE solution for airline marketing departments to solve this potential problem is?????????????

dont mix the topics/feeling, paxs deserve to be in jail!
 

These paxs were behaving badly (illegally perhaps), think about this poor cabin crew that these guys touched, think she could be your mother, little sister, wife or girlfriend, this can not happen. PERIOD.
Picture yourself travelling as a pax in first with you wife and kids, do you think is correct to tolerate a drunk pax near you walking almost naked in a plane? being drunk?
Cabin crew serve alcohol, which is totally ok. They do not know (sometimes they can realize by smelling or just watching the pax) if this pax is already drunk, tired or under influence of medicals/illegal drugs, sometimes they realize that when is a bit late, but it is always the paxs responsability and NEVER the Airline's one.

The moment this guy touched the cabin crew, this guy got a nonstop ticket to jail (and a kick in his balls)

Protect the poor crew and airline.

F@ck this paxs, keep them in jail for what they did

xxx

EY

EYGirl Et Al...
 

:rolleyes: Ho Hum...still missing the point, seems we are going around in circles here :hmm:

Ironbutt, EY Girly and the rest just can't get their heads around the point of this thread can they.

WE ARE NOT DEFENDING THESE CLOWNS

OUR POINT IS THEY SHOULD HAVE BEEN CHARGEDFOR THEIR BEHAVIOUR NOT FOR DRINKING WITHOUT A LICENSE.

:ugh::ugh::ugh:

As much as you guys say don't worry, EY and the Abu Dhabi police will only charge you for drinking without a license if you misbehave, I will worry and all people should worry. My mother or father flying out here on EY may complain to someone about their warm champagne or bad seat, and that person may get upset and vindictive, and decide that since my parents had a drink or two without a license, they can cause them trouble on arrival at Abu Dhabi. The precedent has been set and that is a real worry for anyone contemplating flying through AUH with EY.

AGAIN, THE BEHAVIOUR OF THESE GUYS IS NOT THE POINT, THE POINT IS THE CHARGING OF THEM FOR DRINKING ALCOHOL.

ANSA et al; I think the problem you are having here is cultural. I believe some of the respondents DO NOT understand your point (and I don't know how much more clearly you could state it other than above) because they are from the same culture as the decision making process involved here.
If the flight had've been inbound to Australia when this problem arose, the charges on arrival would've been "conduct endangering an aircraft" or "failure to comply with instruction of the crew" or a similarly purposed law. In the UAE, law-making is a very slow-moving animal. I doubt they would've updated the criminal code {and I stand to be corrected on this} to have such 'modern', particular, crimes. Hence, the police just do what they have been doing for a loooooong time, and slap any old charge on that results in a satisfactory result. They are not used to having such things examined, criticised or publicised. Just as many responding here cannot see the problem- the "just lock them up" mentality.
Some cultures don't question authority. IMHO, that's what this issue is about.

There would definitely be a cultural aspect to this particular situation. However, the act of charging a person with "what can we get him on" as opposed to selecting the charge appropriate to the behaviour encountered is perhaps a psychological issue more than an ethnographic issue in that it also occurs in Western/European cultures.

A long time ago I observed an Australian soldier charged with being Drunk-on-Duty, Absent-from-Duty and Absent-without-Leave.

What happened to cause this soldier to be charged? The morning after a night of approved and supervised consumption of alcohol within the barracks, said gentleman, in reply to an instruction from a gentleman-who-holds-Her Majesty's Commission, proceeded to express his displeasure at the prospect of complying with such an instruction, accompanied by his personal opinion of said gentleman-who-holds-Her Majesty's Commission. He then walked out of the barracks.

Two gentlemen-who-hold-a-warrant for Her Majesty's Commission (very experienced soldiers of many years service) then proceeded to pull out the law manuals and find the most severe charge that they believed they could get him convicted on.

Five minutes into the trial the charge of being Drunk-on-Duty was thrown out. Why, because he wasn't drunk.

Insubordination... perhaps, but not Drunk-on-Duty. It was the wrong charge.

got it now
 

ahhh... the point is drinking without permit is illegal and this guy complained that they were offered drinks by the airline...
Like if you fly with American Airline and they offer you Cocaine and when you land in NY you are arrested for comsumtion?!.

Ooops what a system's failure we have here...!

It must be hard to compatibilise the two systems... (western type of service with middle east laws).

Solution: Do not offer alcoholic drinks inbound to Middle East (better for us)...

insteresting...

Are yes, but what they should have used was "conduct unbecoming of a soldier of the armed forces.. blah blah"

I asked the question before but no answer yet as to the existance in UAE law of penalties for causing a disturbance on a UAE registered flight. It is not against the law to smoke on EK/EY flights...it is against company policy only. Is this the case for disobeying a crew command, threatening safety of crew/pax for which you could use restraints. I previously thought there was a law covering this but recent events have cast a doubt in my mind. Any one know for sure?

EY girl I am pretty sure, but I have been wrong before but I think cocaine is illegal in the US therefor not a good comparison. As I said, I might be wrong, if so sorry....

EY Girl

Your reasoning is exactly what EY is up against, prioritising concern on the basis of your inability to act or take action, which why this incident happened in the first place.

Please limit yourself to follow the procedures that you've been given, as small as they are, you will be advised of your next training course on how to handle passengers and make cocktails for them.

In the meantime, do youself and your employer a favour, keep your comments to yourself.

Thank you

MR:ok:

Not A good example
 

EYGirl,
"Protect the poor crew and airline".
F@ck this paxs, keep them in jail for what they did

"Like if you fly with American Airline and they offer you Cocaine and when you land in NY you are arrested for comsumtion?!."

EY Girl, If you are the true reflection of EY Girls then I rest my case.

Safe and happy flying to all:*

How many people have been stopped in dubai for a random drug test when arriving ? Its not a common occurance.

The laws are there, if your not a drunk asshole, and don't make a scene there is no problem. If you are however they will throw the book at you with everything they've got.

This guy obviously was doing something to get all this attention, except this time he got what he deserved.

EY girl take that bubble gum out of your mouth before opening it.

You are exactly the type to be at the source of this problem we are discussing on this forum.