American Airlines flight attendant to angry passenger: ‘Hit me’

SHARE American Airlines flight attendant to angry passenger: ‘Hit me’
americanairlinesconfrontation.jpg

An unidentified male passenger confronts an American Airlines flight attendant. The passenger became upset after an altercation between the attendant and a female passenger (seen at right in blue) holding a baby left the woman crying. The male passenger can be heart on the video posted to Facebook, telling the flight attendant: “You do that to me and I’ll knock you flat.” The flight attendant responds: “Hit me. Bring it on.” | Screenshot from Facebook video

NEW YORK — Another day, another cellphone video of a conflict on an airplane.

American Airlines said it grounded a flight attendant who got into a verbal confrontation with a passenger after taking a baby stroller away from another passenger on a Friday flight from San Francisco to Dallas-Fort Worth. The incident comes less than two weeks after video of a man being violently dragged off a United Express flight sparked widespread outrage.

A video taken by a passenger and posted on Facebook shows the sobbing woman holding a small child and saying, “You can’t use violence with baby.”

Later, an unidentified male passenger confronts the flight attendant, telling him, “You do that to me and I’ll knock you flat.” The flight attendant responds with “Hit me. Bring it on.”

In an age of cellphone videos and social media, airlines are learning the hard way that it is essential to deescalate tense situations that occur during air travel, even as there are more passengers, less room and fewer flight attendants than ever before.

United initially blamed its passenger, Dr. David Dao, before finally apologizing days after the incident, fanning the public’s fury. American, by contrast, seems to have learned from United’s mistakes: it immediately said it was sorry, that it had grounded the flight attendant while it investigates the incident, and that it had upgraded the passenger involved and her family to first class.

“American doesn’t want to become the next United, but then, United didn’t want to become the next United,” said Henry Harteveldt, travel industry analyst at Atmosphere Research Group. “No airline wants to be seen as being anti-consumer or anti-passenger.”

Smartphone cameras and social media are shifting power to consumers who can share customer relations gaffes with the world. They’re increasingly making confrontations with customer-facing staff headline news, making it harder for companies to sweep complaints under the rug. The faster companies own up to mistakes, the quicker they can start to do damage control.

American’s fast reaction to the incident could be helpful, said brand consultant Allen Adamson, CEO of BrandSimple.

“The quick reaction will prevent it from escalating further, but it won’t mitigate the perception among flyers that flying is becoming a less enjoyable experience every day,” he said.

Overall, airlines must start to put more of an emphasis on customer service, he said.

“It’s another example of airlines struggling to treat their passengers with the traditional ‘customer is always right’ attitude,” he said. “Good customer service is finding a way to deescalate a situation and he (the flight attendant) was throwing gasoline on it.”

Days after Dao was dragged off the United Express flight from Chicago to Kentucky to make room for airline crew, his lawyer spent a good part of a news conference railing against what he said was the industry-wide shabby treatment of airline passengers. Dao lost teeth, suffered a broken nose and received a concussion in the incident, which also was captured on video.

Traveling is stressful under any circumstance, and conflict resolution training is an essential part of being a flight attendant, Harteveldt said.

“If airlines aren’t going to improve staffing or restore leg room for customers, they should at least provide flight attendants with better, more relevant training about how to handle these types of situations,” he said.

At the same time, passengers should also be respectful of flight attendants — who often work long hours on multiple flights — as well, he said.

“It’s just clear in this case things didn’t go the way anybody would have liked, but American Airlines acted responsibly in the aftermath,” he said.

Associated Press writer Juan Lozano in Houston contributed to this report.

The Latest
Despite getting into foul trouble, which limited him to just six minutes in the second half, Shannon finished with 29 points, five rebounds and two assists.
Cowboy hats, bell-bottoms and boots were on full display Thursday night as fans lined up for the first of his three sold-out shows.
The incident occurred about 3:40 p.m. near Minooka. The horse was successfully placed back into the trailer, and the highway reopened about 40 minutes later. No injuries were reported.
The Hawks conceded the game’s only two goals within the first seven minutes and were shut out for the 12th time this season in a 2-0 defeat Thursday.