It's really a rare sight as these prayers are to be said upon rising first thing in the morning." <<<<
No, you are mistaken; as has been stated many times on all the threads about this is that the FLIGHT CREW should have known that the 17 year old was an Orthodox Jewish teenager; not only should ALL flight crews be aware of what teffillin look like and what they are, this fact is compounded by the plane was from La Guardia, which is where a HUGE NUMBER of Orthodox Jews regularly fly into and out of, every single day of the year.
As someone who puts on tefillin daily, when I have put them on on an airplane I have told my seatmates and the flight crew what I was about to do. Tefillin look different, and unlike anything else in contemporary American culture; I could see how it would be disturbing to someone concerned about strange “devices” to see someone wrapping black leather straps around his bare arm and on his head while reciting prayers written in a language that they can’t read (which might be taken to be Arabic).