Spirit Airlines' LAX-Fort Lauderdale Flight Lasts 19 Hours Because Blind Guy Freaked

By Dennis Romero Tue., Jul. 10 2012 at 8:04 AM

Categories: WTF

spirit.com

A blind man's freakout aboard a Spirit Airlines flight from LAX to Fort Lauderdale became a vivid nightmare of a trip for some of those aboard, who waited 10 hours on a Houston tarmac over the weekend.

Flight 310, normally about a 5-hour trip, ended up being an overnight, 19-hour ordeal after the plane made an unplanned stop at Houston's Bush Intercontinental Airport to get rid of the 86-year-old, partially blind man.

He was kicking and ranting in French, adding to the confusion and fear on-board, according to Associated Press and South Florida's Local 10 news.

The problem was this: After making a hasty and unscheduled landing in Houston, an airport Spirit doesn't serve, the airline had to corral a backup crew, as its crew had already worked the mandatory time allowed under federal law.

This, apparently, took 10 hours.

Nearly 100 passengers were inside the plane for 2 hours as it sat on the tarmac, according to a Nightline report on the fiasco last night. One of the issues was that, because Spirit didn't have an infrastructure at the airport, they didn't even have hands and gear to get people off the aircraft.

After that, people somehow got into a terminal, but then they were told they would be taken for a several-hour bus ride to Dallas, where Spirit had a set-up, according to the show. Footage showed that passengers were in an uproar, and that plan was scrapped while a backup plane was brought to Houston.

After that, the plane went to Fort Lauderdale and landed Sunday, nearly 20 hours after its Saturday takeoff from LAX.

In a statement to the Weekly, a Spirit spokeswoman said:

Spirit flight 310 from Los Angeles to Fort Lauderdale was diverted to Houston's Bush Intercontinental, an airport we do not currently serve, yesterday due to a disruptive customer.
We apologize for the inconvenience this caused our customers onboard this flight. However, the safety of our customers is always the top priority when making these decisions.

When we are forced to divert to an airport that Spirit does not currently serve, it takes additional time to secure a gate and assist customers in safely deplaning. In addition, we must adhere to crew duty time requirements, which became a factor in this situation as well.

We flew in another aircraft and crew as quickly as possible in order to take our customers to Fort Lauderdale.

Full refunds are being given to all customers for this flight, as well as a $100 future flight credit for each customer.

Again, we truly apologize to our customers onboard this flight.

Still, passengers complained that they were kept inside the plane without much information as it sat on the hot tarmac in Houston. Some reported there was no air conditioning.

The weather in Houston? In the high 80s.

The blind guy was travelling alone and probably just scared, cops told Local 10. Nightline reported that he might have been mentally challenged. His son traveled from L.A. to pick him up.

[@dennisjromero / djromero@laweekly.com / @LAWeeklyNews]

Tags:

blind, Fort Lauderdale, heat, LAX, Spirit Airlines, unruly passenger

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Skybunny77

Yes the flight might be cheaper, withought them, because there would be no flight withought them. Besides not helping with bags, and not serving anything...., i can tell you one thing they can doo rite, and thats to get your cheap sorry ass out of a burning plane, before you becoume BBQ! Or they can disable an explosive device on that aircraft! Or can be the ones to bring you back after your cardiac arrest or even deliver a child! So the next time you choose to fly, why dont you pork out a couple hundred buck and fly a real airline were the real big dicks are???

Ashley

Spirt has a nack for landing at airports that they don't serve. My flight had to make an unexpected landing in order to refuel because we were ENDANGER of running out! The plane could not land in Myrtle Beach, SC due to fog and we were forced to circle in the air. However, the pilot informed us all that we needed to get to the closest airport possible (Georgia) in order to refuel.This took a LONG time since we had to borrow some from American Airlines. Needless to say, most of us on the plane missed connections to our international flights out of Florida. When we finally arrived.....(8 hours later) in Florida they said there was nothing they could do. The only flights had left for the day. I was connecting to Cancun, and the airline said they would have room to bring my family the following saturday (a week later).....the day we were suppose to fly home from Cancun! I had to buy 4 one way tickets to Cancun on American Airlines LAST minute, and arrived one day late for my vacation. Everyone else on the plane followed suit. Oh did i mention i had to scream at Spiri to give us a hotel voucher that only helped out partially.

GGA

I would have beaten his old ass if he kept me in the air for 19 hours.

Frequent but reluctant Flyer

No mention of what if anything was done to try to calm the man having the panic attack. Did the crew try to find someone who spoke French, did the guy speak no English? Are crews allowed to give any anti-anxiety remedies for panic attacks, like they sometimes give Benadryl to babies who can't stop crying? I even read about a recent flight where some airline booted the family b/c they refused to give the kid Benadryl. (Which doesn't always work, the family may have been right -- it backfired for my baby, made him more overtired and cranky, she cried even louder, all that worked was walking and rocking. But it might have calmed the old guy.) What set off this old guy's panic? Maybe he got pushed into another seat or wasn't allowed to go to the bathroom and didn't understand why not, something that could have been handled if calmly and not with the confrontational attitude airlines use these days toward anyone who doesn't just shut up and obey a flight attendant, no matter what. Anon's point that the crew was useless might be a valid one although not exactly elegantly put. While Flyer just calls the old guy "disruptive" which overlooks that some people have panic attacks, in which case they should have their own anti-anxiety prescription meds but if this guy never flies maybe he didn't expect this. Some flight attendants feel empowered by the new post 9-11 attitudes to treat customers like Gestapo, not people in the service business.

Flyer!

Hey anonymous what the hell does calling the the Flight Attendants(not stewardess) idiots have to do with the fact this passenger being disruptive!

Jon Murray

I've never felt closer to death than when taking off and landing on a Spirit Airlines flight.

Christopher Neal

See, now that's why they should have an emergency exit.

anonymous

Eliminate the idiotic airline stewardess. They don't serve any food or drinks or help you with your baggage & panic at a sneeze. Not worth the money they earn. Flights would be cheaper without them.