Posted on 08/04/2010 8:49:31 AM PDT by Atlas Sneezed
A Toluca Lake woman was recently kicked off a Delta Airlines flight after reporting that she thought she had smelled alcohol on the captain's breath.
Cynthia Angel said the incident occurred on July 19 as she was trying to travel home to Southern California from Georgia. She had just spent two weeks visiting her son, an actor, who was shooting a movie near Atlanta.
Angel, 51, said the trouble occurred after she and three other passengers had a brief conversation with one of the pilots of Delta Airlines Flight 2355. She learned later that the pilot was actually the captain of the flight.
"The flight had been delayed almost an hour," said Angel. "We were in the jetway waiting to get on the flight when the pilot walked by us and I jokingly said, 'Boy you had been here a long time.'"
Angel said the captain spoke to her and the three other passengers. After he walked away, said Angel, another passenger asked if they had smelled alcohol on the pilot's breath.
"A gentleman standing behind me asked, 'Did anyone smell that? It smelled a little like vodka,'" said Angel. "We all agreed that he did smell alcohol, but we didn't know if he had been drinking or what we should do about it."
Angel said she volunteered to talk with the head flight attendant once aboard the plane.
"I told her that I didn't know what protocol is, but I believe I smelled alcohol on one of the pilots' breath," said Angel.
Angel said the flight attendant immediately talked to another pilot who was in the cockpit getting ready for departure.
"He asked me to come inside the cockpit, where he shut the door and asked me about my conversation with the pilot in the jetway," said Angel. "I told him what I had told the flight attendant; that other passengers and I thought we had smelled alcohol on the pilot's breath."
Angel said the pilot informed her that it was the captain of the flight who spoke with her. He assured her that the captain had not been drinking.
"He said he had been with the captain for several hours before the flight," said Angel. "I was satisfied with the pilot's explanation, thanked him and returned to my seat."
But Angel said that 20 minutes later, a Delta Airlines manager came aboard the flight and asked her to follow him off the plane.
"The manager wanted to hear what I had told the flight attendant," said Angel. "He then told me the captain took a test that proved he did not have anything to drink."
Angel said the manager then thanked her and she returned to her seat on the plane. At this point, she thought it was over.
"About 20 minutes later, the Delta manager returned with a female colleague and they asked me to gather my belongings and follow them off the flight," said Angel. "I was so embarrassed."
Angel said she followed them back into the airport. She was lead into a nearby office where she was told again that the pilot had tested negatively for alcohol.
"They told me they take these accusations very seriously and that the captain and his crew did not want me on his flight," said Angel.
Angel said Delta gave her meal and hotel vouchers, and said she could come back in the morning to take another flight back to Los Angeles.
"All I did was voice my concerns," said Angel. "I wasn't a threat to anyone and for them to remove me was wrong."
"I understand airlines have to have protocol," said Mark Silverman, Angel's Beverly Hills-based attorney who Angel contacted to look into the incident.
Silverman said his office has called and written Delta Airlines for a response and to ask the airline to open an investigation into the incident.
"She was just trying to be a good citizen. You'd think Delta would thank her for her concern," he said.
NBCLA also contacted Delta Airlines for comment. Susan Elliott from Delta's corporate communications office sent this response via e-mail: "Once we have reviewed Mrs. Angel's letter and investigated her claims, we will follow-up with her on our findings."
"Making drinking accusations against pilots is a serious matter," said Ross Aimer, CEO of Aviation Experts, LLC.
"If you think someone is drunk, you owe it to yourself, your loved ones and other passengers to report it," said Aimer, who is also a retired United Airlines captain. "However, in this case, because the captain had not been drinking, Delta made the right decision by asking her to leave the plane."
Aimer explains that in situations like this, flights usually end up delayed or canceled because the captain will take himself off the flight.
"It's an either you or me situation," said Aimer. "She had to go because the captain has his crew and hundreds of other passengers to think about."
Aimer adds that if he found himself in a similar situation, he'd do the same thing.
"The issue of pilots and drinking has become a very big deal, and accusations like that could end your career," Aimer said.
“If the management of Southwest can get their personnel to be polite
why are the other airlines so hostile?”
Thanks for that recommendation for Southwest, if you don’t mind me calling it that. Airlines are under significant pressure, don’t treat employees very well, so we passengers get the raw end of their frustrations. It is good to hear SW doesn’t do that. I have never flown SW.
10 Billion was in forced low interest loans. But I guess it all depends what the meaning of BAILOUT means to you.
“No airline has been given a cent. All of the funds from the Air Transport Safety and Stabilization Act went to public institutions or to guarantee loans”
Loans to whom if the airlines weren’t given a cent? Nice spin of the facts.
“BTW, you won’t be successful suing an airline pilot for doing his job.”
Not so. He has a job to do but he does not enjoy complete ammunity from civil suit. That is NOT what the FARs say. He must answer for his actions.
“Safety is not the issue. False accusation is.
“
Alcohol breath is not a false accusation. Your assertion no flight crew flies with a drunk doesn’t hold up to history. Plenty of air crews know of it as has been shown in all the incidents of drunk pilots. I personally know of it. I personally know pilots that lost their tickets after drinking themselves out of a job.
“In your job, do you get alcohol and drug testing every 6 months, and random every 24 months? Do have written regulations that specify exactly how many hours after ANY drink before you can even show up at the airport in uniform? Do you have co-workers who would turn you in at the drop of a hat because to keep it quiet would be career-ending?
“
I am intimately familiar with airline pilots and probably have forgotten more about airway sciences than you can remember.
I may get annoyed maybe even angry but I would NEVER
show it. If the passengers were genuinely concerned
I would shrug it off and act PROFESSIONALY.
Not retaliate and throw them off the plane.
I have been in aviation for 35 years and am ashamed
at this behavior.
She should be glad they gave her the boot. If she really thought he was drinking did she want to fly on that plane?
” I am an FAA examiner as well. “
“It is not the job of passengers to accuse pilots of drinking on duty. “
Those two statements do not jive. It is everyone’s responsibility to report any safety issue including those involving pilots. Where do you get off thinking pilots are above reproach? Your statement does not agree with the FAA’s statements on pilot safety.
I would most definitely get off any plane where I smelled alcohol on the pilot’s breath. My next and immediate call would be to 911 and report it, followed by a few more calls and reporting it to the local airline and airport personnel. That pilot wouldn’t be going anywhere.
If I were that flight crew that took her complaint I would have addressed it with the pilot in question. If I found the pilot not to be drunk I would invite him to meet the passenger by bringing her to the cockpit and ask him to thank her for her concern. It could have been a mouthwash or cologne or something she didn’t understand. If he was drunk, well, then the trouble begins for everyone.
“I have been in aviation for 35 years and am ashamed
at this behavior.
“
I am ashamed, too. Pilots, and I am a private pilot, have authority but it comes, as you know, with responsibility. No pilot is above question when it comes to such things as possibly being drunk.
P.S. I would be thrilled if someone took enough concern to ensure I was not drunk. People sit around and never do anything if they think it might cause them to get off their butt. A polite and confidential question of alcohol breath would not upset me. I would be more than happy to ensure that passenger they were safe with me flying the plane. I would have invited her to the cockpit and let her perosnally know I am fine. Hopefully she would be proud of her concern and have more faith in my abilities as a professional pilot. It would have gone a long way to a happier customer for me and my airline.
“The flying public is not qualified to determine safety”
Wrong! They are not qualified to judge pilot competency, but they sure as Hell are qualified to judge drunk enough to report suspicion.
“They were wrong.”
This time, but there have been plenty of other times they were right. Plenty of passengers and airline personnel have reported, successfully, drunk pilots. You can’t possibly try to say otherwise.
“Hopefully she would be proud of her concern and have more faith in my abilities as a professional pilot. It would have gone a long way to a happier customer for me and my airline.”
I like your attitude.
I do it every day and it works like magic.
Wish you worked for me.
Hilarious Man!
‘Drunk’ Pilot Sparks Revolt on Flight to New York
It is normally a moment of cheery reassurance when an airline pilot greets passengers during preparations for take-off. But Alexander Cheplevsky sparked panic on flight Aeroflot 315 when he began to speak.
His slurred and garbled comments ahead of a Dec. 29 flight from Moscow to New York convinced passengers that he was drunk. When he apparently switched from Russian into unintelligible English, fear turned to revolt.
Flight attendants initially ignored passengers’ complaints and threatened to expel them from the Boeing 767 jet unless they stopped “making trouble”. As the rebellion spread, Aeroflot representatives boarded the aircraft to try to calm down the 300 passengers.
One sought to reassure them by announcing that it was “not such a big deal” if the pilot was drunk because the aircraft practically flew itself.
Cheplevsky did little to ease passengers’ fears by refusing to leave the cockpit to show that he was sober. When he was finally persuaded to face them, witnesses said that he appeared unsteady on his feet and had bloodshot eyes.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,487665,00.html
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