Posted on 05/11/2015 7:05:40 AM PDT by ilovesarah2012
(CBSNews) — An Oregon family traveling with a 15-year old autistic girl was kicked off a flight this week for what the airline calls a “disruptive” situation.
The family calls it an outrage.
Video shot by a fellow passenger and posted to YouTube showed Salt Lake City airport police removing the family from a United Airlines flight last Tuesday, after the pilot made an emergency landing.
The girl’s mother, Donna Beegle, was shocked when officers explained why.
“He said, ‘Well, the captain doesn’t feel comfortable flying to Portland with your daughter on his flight,” Beegle told CBS News.
The trouble began halfway through the flight from Houston to Portland. Beegle says her daughter, Juliette, was hungry and started to act up.
“I know her. When she gets over hungry or over thirsty, she really struggles,” Beegle described.
Her mother says Juliette is a picky eater, so she asked a flight attendant if she could purchase a hot meal from first class — and says she was told no.
“Well, I said, ‘How about we wait for her to have a meltdown and then she is crying and tries to scratch — and then you’ll want to help her,'” Beegle said she told the flight attendant.
Beegle eventually got the meal and said Juliette calmed down. Then came an announcement from the captain.
“We were shocked to hear them say, ‘We’re going to make an emergency landing in Salt Lake City, we have a passenger in the back of the plane who has behavior issues,'” Beegle said.
(Excerpt) Read more at 5newsonline.com ...
She blackmailed the airline into providing something, but stating her child would get violent.
The Captain is ‘”Master of the aircraft” and has final authority AND responsibility to all passengers on the plane.
Once informed of a threatening violent passenger, he made the call. He has sole authority to do this. The minute mom made a threat of violence, he really had no choice.
She didn’t pay thousands. If she had (LIKE SHE SHOULD) flown first class, she would have had a hot meal. I like hot meals too, but don’t want to pay first class prices to get them.
She KNOWS her daughter has issues and tried to cheap out, then threatened the airline with violence from her kid. Sorry no sympathy here.
(Note, I live with a mentally disable adult, my wife’s sister for the past 15 years)
Omgosh...if the child had scratched someone?? She was in a window seat beside her large dad and mom.
When did conservatives become so scared of 15 yr old upset girls?
Wow...the captain brought a plane down in a emergency landing because a prissy male attendant would not throw a meal into a microwave for a kid with low blood sugar per her moms request. Blackmail??? Because a mom with a disabled child was trying to avoid a problem you are calling her a blackmailer??
Wow...the captain brought a plane down in a emergency landing because a prissy male attendant would not throw a meal into a microwave for a kid with low blood sugar per her moms request. Blackmail??? Because a mom with a disabled child was trying to avoid a problem you are calling her a blackmailer??
A scratch can blind someone. The pilot could not allow the other paying customers to be subjected to that possibility, once the threat was verbalized by the mother. His decision was mature, rational, and conservative. Thankfully some adults can still take charge.
The pilot is certified to fly a jet and is responsible for all on board.
I’m guessing that job is a bit more complex than driving kids to a soccer game.
Ridiculous. She was simply stating the truth. You OBVIOUSLY have zero experience with autistic kids.
How hard would it have been for the staff to make an accommodation to a situation? Not hard. Simple human decency and kindness would have helped -- that's all.
All those passengers had their lives disrupted because the staff couldn't hit a button on a microwave to help a struggling guest on their plane. Give me a break. She needed something that the airline had every means of providing, but they refused to BELIEVE the mother.
Good question.
She paid for 4 round trip tickets from Oregon to FL. What do you think she paid?
The captain is “MASTER OF THE AIRCRAFT”. That is his title responsibility. As such, he is responsible for EVERY passenger on the plane.
When informed, he had a threatened violent passenger on board, what did you expect him to do? He cannot babysit the passenger and fly the plane both.
She obviously did not pay FIRST CLASS!
""The paramedic said this was an over-reactive flight attendant and started shaking his head, and said 'We have real work to do' and left," she said. "We were still baffled." Police then came to their row, Beegle said. "They see this little teenager sitting there watching a video and they asked if there was an issue, and I said, 'No.'" When the officers started to leave, the captain stepped out of the cockpit and said something to them, Beegle said. They then asked her family to leave, she said.
I have taken care of my wife's mentally handicapped sister for past 15 years.
My wife and I know her limitations and don't except the world to cater to her every need or want.
Again, you are wrong. They had their life's disrupted because the mother made a threat. You don't do that and get to stay on the plane. Try it yourself and see!
If anybody has a tendency to freak out and become violent,
then they probably ought not to be on an airplane.
Yes she wasn’t first class but how about just accommodating a distressed child with special needs that the mother is begging for. I am sure that it cost $10,000s for that plane to divert and multiple emergency personal to come aboard. Even the paramedics and cops were dumbfounded with the situation. A professional pilot should have handled this differently and more professionally. It seems that once the young girl got a hot meal she was fine.
I wouldn’t travel in public with a kid that needed that much attention. Private travel in a car is one thing, but public travel on airlines is a step too far for me.
/johnny
Nope, it’s not the autism that is the problem here, it’s the mom!
Agree and agree!! Mom wants to play victim, rather than parent.
So she must be provided whatever she wants, at all costs,
or else she will get all crazy and attack people? Hell yeah.
Where do I sign up for that?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.