Kicked off a plane because of an overweight child?

[Mark Latimour]

Originally Posted by Sacbee.com

Petite passenger booted from Southwest flight

Southwest Airlines made headlines earlier this year for kicking overweight actor-director Kevin Smith off a flight because he took up more than one seat.

Now we're hearing the airline recently removed a 5-foot-4, 110-pound Sacramento-area woman from a plane so a hefty passenger could have an extra seat.

The incident happened last week on an early-evening Southwest flight from Las Vegas to Sacramento.

The local woman was flying standby, paid full fare for the last available seat, got on board, stowed her bags and sat down – only to be told she would have to deplane immediately.

The reason?

A late-arriving passenger required two seats because of her girth.

The Sacramento woman, a frequent-flying sales rep, was stunned.

"It didn't seem right that I should have to leave to accommodate someone who had only paid for one seat," she tells us. (She has asked to remain anonymous for fear some may regard her as insensitive.)

She's even more miffed because she says Southwest personnel berated her when she questioned the decision to boot her from the plane.

She ended up getting on the next flight.

"It's small potatoes, in the scheme of things," she says. But she believes Southwest should have been more considerate.

Airline spokeswoman Marilee McInnis agrees.

"We know this was awkward and we should have handled it better," she says, adding that the airline intends to apologize to the local woman.

McInnis says normal policy is to ask for volunteers when a flight is overbooked for any reason.

In this instance, she says, airline personnel may have been influenced to choose a faster course of action to reduce embarrassment for the late-arriving passenger.

Why the extra concern? The person requiring two seats was just 14 years old.

Source: http://www.sacbee.com/2010/07/24/291...link=lingospot

[XigXag]

Each and every day the airlines do something which strengthens my resolve to never use their crappy service again.


Also- "Hey 14 yr old, lose some weight, thats ridiculous."

[i_got_a_mohawk]

They should have asked, I can understand the problem with kicking a child off the plane.

If the child was travelling with someone, that would leave more empty seats. If the child was travelling alone, you don't exactly want to leave them on their own without them knowing where to go or what to do.

I hope they charge the childs parents with extra fee's to cover the ladies seat and inconvenience.

Also, must have been one hell of a size of 14 year old!

[vene-nemesis]

I wonder when are they going to instal those things you have on theme parks to ride atractions on the ticket salesplaces, you know the "you must be this tall to ride" but instead like "you must be this thin/wide to pay for one seat". Itll be more sensible.

[Simo98]

Seriously, pay by weight.

Every airfare has a charge of x dollars per kilogram, when you go to check in you walk up with all your baggage, stand on a platform and weigh the whole lot, then pay, if you take up two seats so be it, but you have to pay a lot more than a smaller person.

Kids are cheaper, fat people are more expensive. Baggage is charged on weight too, so no more working out excess baggage allowances and all that fuss. The downside is that us tall folk get charged extra.. but I guess we can deal with that as we are superior in every other way..

[i_got_a_mohawk]

Originally Posted by Simo98

Seriously, pay by weight.

Every airfare has a charge of x dollars per kilogram, when you go to check in you walk up with all your baggage, stand on a platform and weigh the whole lot, then pay, if you take up two seats so be it, but you have to pay a lot more than a smaller person.

Kids are cheaper, fat people are more expensive. Baggage is charged on weight too, so no more working out excess baggage allowances and all that fuss. The downside is that us tall folk get charged extra.. but I guess we can deal with that as we are superior in every other way..

Talk about dealing with it in your own way!

I may be carrying a bit of extra bulk, but I'm pretty big built, 6ft4, 270lbs (~123Kg) and I don't spill onto anyone elses seat, balls to having to pay even more for flights!

[bmc]

She's a standby passenger, subject to space availability.

No space. No seat.

Nothing unusual here folks.

Airline staff live by the same rules. If you are standing by for a full flight and there are late inbound connecting passengers that show up after the flight has been closed, you will be subject to being offloaded.

That's what standby is all about.

The fact that a fatty needed two seats is a separate issue and not related to flying standby.

[champbassist]

Originally Posted by i_got_a_mohawk

Talk about dealing with it in your own way!

I may be carrying a bit of extra bulk, but I'm pretty big built, 6ft4, 270lbs (~123Kg) and I don't spill onto anyone elses seat, balls to having to pay even more for flights!

Then how about BMI?

[Jim Campbell]

Originally Posted by bmc

She's a standby passenger, subject to space availability.

No space. No seat.

Nothing unusual here folks.

Airline staff live by the same rules. If you are standing by for a full flight and there are late inbound connecting passengers that show up after the flight has been closed, you will be subject to being offloaded.

That's what standby is all about.

The fact that a fatty needed two seats is a separate issue and not related to flying standby.

not if the booked passenger is not paying for the extra seat.....

[i_got_a_mohawk]

Originally Posted by champbassist

Then how about BMI?

While slightly better than weight alone is still pretty useless

[zachoff]

I <3 fat America.

[Thunderscreech]

I think we need to make things smaller to motivate people to loose weight.

[L-A]

Originally Posted by Thunderscreech

I think we need to make things smaller to motivate people to loose weight.

Like stadiums with two attendance capacities - US and Japan?

Check.

[Webtroll]

As a large and fairly overweight person I want to make it clear that while airlines should have the capacity to carry large people I also think we should pay a premium when it inconveniences someone else. Only paid for one seat but need 2 and the plane is full? Pay for the other seat or get off.

As to paying per pound or BMI, sure, as long as the space reflects it. Skinny and paying half? You get a child's seat.

[Bard2dbone]

Originally Posted by Webtroll

As a large and fairly overweight person I want to make it clear that while airlines should have the capacity to carry large people I also think we should pay a premium when it inconveniences someone else. Only paid for one seat but need 2 and the plane is full? Pay for the other seat or get off.

As to paying per pound or BMI, sure, as long as the space reflects it. Skinny and paying half? You get a child's seat.

Everyone gets a chillds seat already. Have you ever looked at how narrow those things are? And compare that to how narrow the average adult ass isn't?

Originally Posted by champbassist

Then how about BMI?

Dude. Do NOT ger me started on how useless BMI is. That thing pisses me off on a visceral level. It pretends to be a useful measurement of fitness. But all it really is is height vs weight. It is useless at best. I hate that at my skinniest point ever, when I was so underweight that all my ribs were visible, BMI said I was all the way down to only "Very Obese". When I was in the best shape of my life, spending more than an hour in the gym every day, muscled way up and with an actual bodyfat of 9%, BMI said I was "Morbidly Obese". Now that I'm old and legitimately fat, I refuse to even speculate what my BMI would be.

[Phalex]

Originally Posted by Simo98

Seriously, pay by weight.

Every airfare has a charge of x dollars per kilogram, when you go to check in you walk up with all your baggage, stand on a platform and weigh the whole lot, then pay, if you take up two seats so be it, but you have to pay a lot more than a smaller person.

Kids are cheaper, fat people are more expensive. Baggage is charged on weight too, so no more working out excess baggage allowances and all that fuss. The downside is that us tall folk get charged extra.. but I guess we can deal with that as we are superior in every other way..

That's a fine idea except that under your model fat people pay more, and scrawny people pay less. The airlines have no interest in anybody paying less. They want everyone to pay more.

IMO a seat should have a set price. how many you need should be the question.

[Phalex]

Originally Posted by champbassist

Then how about BMI?

BMI is based on averages and what some average person decided the average persons mass should be.

I'm a fatass myself, I freely admit that, but I've always been a big guy. I was damn near 12# when I was born. My BMI was probably off the chart back then. I could stand to lose a little weight, but if I weighed the 160lbs they say I should I'd look like a concentration camp survivor.

[ckitz]

Originally Posted by Simo98

... The downside is that us tall folk get charged extra.. but I guess we can deal with that as we are superior in every other way..

+100 for us tall people!

[L-A]

Originally Posted by Phalex

IMO a seat should have a set price. how many you need should be the question.

While I agree, there seems to be a problem:

Lessen the number of seats, and everyone has to pay more. As it is (standard seat size, 3 class), a 747-8 can hold ~445 passengers.

That means everyone pays 0.14$/mile in jet fuel use. Now what do you need to include anyone willing to fly in this country? The actual european standard is 17 inches wide. Butts will go up to what, 32-34 inches? It's twice the width, and you're still rejecting some people, actually discriminating more than before.

Supposing that Airbus or Boeing do get some engineers on this, it means that flying on such a plane, you pay a dollar for every three to four miles the plane flies (ignoring air currents that will either help or degrade consumption). It also means the plane is pricier itself, as it will require a complete layout redesign but will be sold to a few select companies only.

In the end, profit is still higher for the airline if they treat the odd huge passenger to a double-seat price, at the risk of losing that particular client.

[Relic]

Why is this even an issue? She was flying "standby". STANDBY.
The fact that this is even being discussed is kind of silly.