[lastchance]

The airline should have offered the family the opportunity to fly on the next flight available (preferably soon after the flight in question, since tantrums of this magnitude are generally followed by complete exhaustion and sound sleep).

I agree. I had not noticed the 24 hour wait required.
I also did not advocate whupping the child but simply getting her calmed down somewhere besides the airplane.

I appreciate that an airplane can be a very scary place for a child, that is why I did not call for whupping her.
She needed to be calmed down and obviously she was not calming down on the plane.

[JSteff]

"I appreciate that an airplane can be a very scary place for a child"

Yeah but geez, if you let them sit inside the cabin it is much less frightening to the child. Nothing different than sitting anywhere on the ground..

At that point you do not need to deal with anything but the child behaving or parent and brat getting off the aircraft.

Nothing like taking minutes out of someone else's life while your brat throws a tantrum. That is the parents problem not the worlds.