Piltdown Man

The facts are that you have flown, landed, the doors are open and now, as a passenger, you are waiting for something to happen. The flight is legally over so now the Capatin is just a mere human being. No memo any Gob****e in O'Leary's caravan does anything to enhance the former captain's status. If you want to get off, you get off. Finish! Nobody has any rights to detain you against your will (in Europe). Your job as Captain is now to try to get what's left back to wherever your company want it, when they want it. So if Pax want to get off, let them. Just remember who has got off and if they had any checked in bags. When the next flight starts, you are Captain again and have all sorts of wierd and wonderful powers!

sarah737

P man,

Strange that you care about checked in bags, the disembarking pax might have left whatever he wants inside the cabin... So if you let one pax go you need to do a security search in the cabin, so MOLE's note might be legal after all...

el @

I also wanted to comment about Bealzebub saying that one can be 'charged accordingly' because breach of contract. That is simply not possible. The Airline/Capt can surely warn the pax he that will be sued for recovery of damages, but not more than than. If the airline has passenger's credit card details, any further charge would be clearly be illegal. Only a court of civil justice can decide on the matter, and a litigation has to be started first. I wonder how many legal departments in an Airline would go for this.

I can agree, however, that the Airline can refuse to unload any baggage to accomodate the pax. Here they can enforce the contract as it is about objects and not persons, claim security/operational issues and just send baggage to the destination.

Bealzebub

Excuse me el @ but where did I say that ? I said "dealt with accordingly" which is something entirely different. I don't mind you quoting me, but please make the effort to do it correctly if you are going to do so. As such what you go on to say is meaningless since it wasn't suggested.

The last paragraph is simply not possible in many jurisdictions as a matter of statute, and in fact only reinforces the arguement about disrupting the regularity of air navigation in accordance with article 77 of the ANO (in the UK ).

Actually I have found the point where I said "charged accordingly" , this was referring to a charge ( monetary) levied for a situation where a passenger had utilized a through fare in order to obtain a pecuniary advantage and as such could be charged the difference by the airline. I think you have taken this out of context.

derekl

sarah:

The disembarking pax had to get whatever he/she wanted onto the aircraft in the first place, then rely on an unscheduled diversion to depart the aircraft and leave whatever in the cabin.

Sorry, but that's a bit of a complicated and unlikely terrorist plot, don't you think?

DISCOKID

Doesn't the fact that the ANO now has a section saying that "every person in an aircraft shall obey all lawful commands which the commander may give for the purpose of securing.. ..................... safety, efficiency or regularity of air navigation" mean that they could use this as a basis to ask you to remain on the plane. The efficiency and regularity would be affected if a passenger left and caused a subsequent delay

This clause seems to be completely separate to the section that states that the commander is responsible for the operation when doors are closed therefore implying it would also apply on the ground.

I imagine in ryanairs case they would probably just not put the steps down thus ensuring noone gets the idea of leaving.

PPRuNe Pop

I think you will find that the Captain may detain passengers on board until and if the position is blatantly clear.

1) That he will be departing to original destination within a short period of time after diversion.

2) That he may NOT detain them if a 'period of time' passes whereby it is necessary and desirable to disembark ALL passengers under the auspices of the company's handling agents.

It is also clear that any single passenger leaving the aircraft would put in jeopardy the security and safety of ALL passengers.

Yes, and the bag situation would be a nightmare. Probably making the other passengers flaming mad!!!!

And..........you can dress it up all you like. The Captain MUST take control of the situation - something he is legally entitled to do.

Bealzebub

If it is the pasengers will to disembark then as I have already said it is hard to imagine a situation where they would be prevented from doing so, since nobody wants an uncooperative or disruptive person on board. If as you now suggest it is the passengers wish to disembark then it is incumbent upon the Captain or his representative to point out the reasons why this may not be permitted. Those reasons may not be clear to some of the passengers in the absence of such direction.

The companies likelyhood of success in any subsequent potential application for recovery is beyond the scope of this thread and better dealt with in another forum at another time, but I suspect it might not be as difficult as you alude to, depending on the circumstances.

A Captain would not normally take any "action" other than to report the matter to the relevant authorities as approriate to the situation. Punitive action is not normally within a Captains remit save as to defined circumstances that are not within the narrower margins of this threads scope.

However article 77 of the ANO and the Tokyo convention are likely relevant. (Hence the reference to the discussion on its shortcomings and interpretations contained within the article I referred you to.) It might be worth your while to also look at section 94 of the Civil Aviation Act particularly the words "for the purpose of disembarkation" which in the case of this example clearly wouldn't apply.

Fly3

I have had an experience of this situation in the middle east. Having diverted from Dubia to Muscat due to fog, none of the Omani passengers were allowed to disembark, although we were on the ground for over four hours and could have off loaded their luggage. The authorities insisted that they must stay onboard and return to Dubia and fly to Muscat from there.

Flap 5

So how about the situation with the Air Phuket flight that stops in the middle east. The passengers see fuel leaking from the wings and demand to be let off the aircraft as they fear for their safety. The company can insist that they stay on board as per their 'contract with the air carrier'?

It may be a different situation but the principle is the same. The passengers are wanting to leave the aircraft of their own volition.

Lasiorhinus

I see nothing wrong with letting pax disembark after an unscheduled diversion, especially if we will be on the ground for a while.
However I will make no attempt whatsoever to offload their baggage until the final destination, and shall make this clear to the pax, whereupon it becomes their choice. Leave now, or follow your bags to where you thought you were going when we left the ground before.

Seat1APlease

Thinking further perhaps it is significant that it is Ryanair who see this as a problem.

Normally when a passenger books a seat from A to B it is because he wants to go to B. If through bad weather they have to divert to some fleapit 50 miles down the road with no infrastructure or transport links then most passengers would rather stay onboard for 20 minutes, refuel and continue to their destination.

If in the case of Ryanair you have been diverted from Frankfurt (Hahn) to Frankfrut international because of it's cat3 capabilites, then the thought of staying on board for half an hour then flying back to Hahn, in the middle of nowhere, arriving when the last connecting bus will have left, to be entrusted to the care of Ryanair's legendary ground customer support staff is less appealing than getting off the aircraft at FRA and taking the fast train into town.

The list is endless Luebeck, Skavsta, Charleroi, Orio, Gerona etc all places where no-one actually wants to go to.

Golf Charlie Charlie

Several years ago (before 9/11, for what it's worth), I was diverted to Manchester from Heathrow on an inbound Qantas flight due to fog. I elected to travel to London by train, which they allowed me to do with no problem at all, but they made it clear I would not get my bag and that it would fly down to Heathrow later, with its collection my responsibility. In the event, for other reasons, this was no problem for me. I guess Seat1a's point is very valid - it depends on where you end up, and ending up at a large airport presents many decent alternatives.

oliver2002

The memo makes perfect sense from FRs view. If a pax wishes to deplane and stop his journey, FR will have to make arrangements to unload all the luggage from the aircraft spread it around for the pax to inspect (the 737s they use don't have luggage containers), reload all baggage into the aircraft, checkin all the tags if there is no pice left behind by the pax, redo the load sheets etc etc. As FR is most likely not to have any ground service/staff contracted in that location this will all cost a nice packet. Plus the aircraft is even further delayed throwing the shedule into chaos and the crew may go overtime. Considering that most FR pax are the frugal 'I'm not paying one extra pence for service' type, I guess FR will get away with it.

No chance of this type of policy being enforced on a american carrier or a full service airline with perhaps F pax on board an intercont airliner.

One question: is there a way carriers can insure themselves to cover the costs of such thing happening?

QDMQDMQDM

Interesting question. I sat as a passenger on a Northwest 747 a few years ago at Washington Dulles in December in freezing rain. We were still at the gate and I watched the port wing be deiced. As the truck moved to the other wing, I could actually watch the ice reaccumulating. At that very moment, the FO came on and said we would be pushing back as soon as the truck had finished the other wing. I was up and walking to the front with my carry-on bag and thankfully just as I was about to tell the steward I wanted to get off, the FO came back on and said we'd all be disembarking because the ice was reaccumulating too fast.

I imagine most readers of this board would have done what I did and I don't think there is any way one can be stopped, or is there? The door was already closed.

QDM

atse

I would be amazed if this emphatic sentence taken from the Ryanair memo was true in the global sense that is implied. This is all so very Ryanair and it undoubtedly has less to do with the law than other considerations. May I suggest an interpretation ...

1. As a first line of defence against our having a delay while people get off the aircraft this is a really good way to start, since most people will accept such an emphatic statement.

2. If we tell our pilots that it's the law, then they will toe the line rather than do anything else and they might even sound sincere! (Also a great way to get your story spread and believed).

3. If anyone challenges us, we will throw the book at them and certainly make sure they run up significant legal costs if they take us to court. (We know that this works a treat with troublemakers, especially when they start up anti-Ryanair "I was kidnapped by Ryanair" websites, or the like).

4. The problem will then go away and the legality or otherwise of our memo will not be an issue.

As oliver2002 says: Would this memo be applied in circumstances where FR wanted the aircraft brought straight back to base from the diversion airfield? I kinda think not!

Globaliser

As far as I am aware, there are currently no commercial UK airlines who owe any obligations to anyone under the Human Rights Act, and therefore none of their passengers have any right to compensation under that Act.QF won't do this any more. (I also remember other airlines allowing this at MAN in the past after diversions from LON.)

A couple of years ago, I was diverted from SYD to MEL because of fog. Nobody with checked bags on board was allowed off at MEL, because there was no baggage handling capacity there for diverted aircraft. IIRC, there was one person allowed off because he only had cabin baggage, and after a substantial amount of negotiation three out of a family of four were allowed off on the condition that the father remained on board, flew to SYD with the bags and then flew all the bags back to MEL on a domestic. Me, I wanted to get off and get on the MEL-WLG flight that was at the next gate instead of going on to SYD and taking my chances with the SYD-WLG flight I was booked on, or subsequent flights - no go. But I made my booked SYD-WLG flight because it too had been delayed sufficiently.

DistantRumble

Let's try a different tack. As a passenger if I stood up and said [ politely ] - Thanks, but I no longer wish to remain on the aircraft and I'd like to get off now. We're on the ground with engines off.

If the captain says no, then just ask for the Police to be called [ if in UK or Ireland ] Alternatively call them yourself. When they arrive ask for an escort to the terminal.

This of course assumes you REALLY don't want to fly onwards and your hold luggage is of little concern. Also the perhaps unwanted police attention.

atakacs

Just to add some salt into the discussion…

What if the diversion actually happens to be you final destination ?!

It happened to me a few years ago on a Swissair flight that diverted to GVA (supposed to land in ZHR and the take a connection to GVA). That being said I was able to disembark and the bag simply made the GVA ZHR GVA roundtrip

unwiseowl

Regarding "false imprisonment" what about when your train stops between staions due to snow/leaves/breakdown - would it be legal to climb off and walk home?