On July 20th, Julianna’s (delayed) Delta flight landed in Atlanta at 7:30pm, with a connecting flight scheduled for 8:05pm. Julianna, who has muscular dystrophy, missed the connecting flight because nobody came with a wheelchair until 8:05—the same time the connecting flight took off. To make matters worse, the plane crew told Julianna she might make the flight anyway if she stopped waiting for help and got off the plane right now, so she crawled down the stairs on her own. When the wheelchair came she was “wheeled into a back room and advised” that her plane had taken off. But that was just the first half of her ordeal, and the next eight hours only got worse.
The employees in this room were debating who would get me to the ticket gate to be re-ticketed because it was no one’s job and the appropriate personnel were not responding to their calls. After that was resolved I was given a new boarding pass for a flight expected to leave at 12:55 AM. Then this person advised me she cannot get me from a D Gate to Gate A9. She again called for the appropriate personnel who never showed. We waited by an elevator for someone she convinced to bring me over to Gate A even though it was not his job. I had to beg him to stop at a bathroom entrance and to wait for me and then he finally delivered me to Gate A9.
I was given a meal voucher for my INCONVENIENCE but could not purchase any food because again there was no one to bring me to an eating establishment, never mind wait on the long line for me to make a food purchase.
At 11:15 I advised the gate attendant I was dehydrated and cramping because I could not purchase any water. This is the only nice employee that treated me with dignity. The flight I was transferred to was supposed to leave at 10:22 PM but was delayed until 1:30 AM. This gate attendant went and brought me water off of the plane.
This gate attendant also made sure she finally found some one at 11:15 PM to push me to obtain food and another bathroom break. I arrived in West Palm Beach at 3:15 AM with no ride and had to again crawl into the shuttle service to get home.
I understand plane delays and waiting at airports, but is this how you treat your handicapped passengers???
The text above is from a letter Julianna has sent to Richard Anderson, Delta’s CEO, who we hope will do more than send her another food voucher—like take real steps to make sure handicapped passengers are treated with a minimum of respect when they’re traveling.
(Thanks to Chris)
(Photo: Andrei Dimofte)
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@floraposte: I suspect it’s an interface problem, also, probably exacerbated by outsourcing of services. But regardless of what happened I think the airline is the one ultimately responsible.
@joellevand: I know, but someone’s responsible for this. Perhaps “fired” isn’t the right word, but the people who should have been there should be punished. Along with the people who were there, but did nothing.
What happened was a complete lack of customer service. And it will continue to happen so long as people are disconnected so much from others that they stop treating people as human beings.
Depraved indifference is a criminal offense. Julianna should contact the district attorney in Atlanta and lodge a criminal complaint. It’s a simple matter to find out who was on duty.
The employees had a duty to help the passenger or call an ambulance. The law doesn’t allow you to watch a handicapped person crawl around on the floor.
@drjayphd: No, you aren’t wrong. A reporter wrote that no one called the police, and the public reacted in outrage, and it has since become a famous case for that reason. People still mention it as proof that our society is in decline. Neighbors interviewed since have said that they felt wrongly maligned because of that story, and it’s unfortunate. I’m glad you mentioned that. I try to also mention that neighbors actually did call the police whenever that story comes up.
As for no one assisting Julianna as she was crawling, I would think the fact that it’s 3 AM (not a hugely busy airport time, no matter where you are) plus the fact that people are completely self-absorbed makes it pretty plausible to me.
Nothing too much more to add other than ick. I often fly between two regional airports for work and Delta was my preferred choice of those available. Ugh, not anymore.
@Clold:
It’s likely that she could not use a manual wheelchair — with MD, muscles atrophy and she may not have had the necessary strength to wheel herself. This seems to be the case, reading between the lines.
This makes traveling by plane exponentially more difficult. If one wishes to take an electric wheelchair on the plane, first the batteries have to be removed then the chair is stowed in the hold without them. You have to have batteries available at the destination because they can’t be flown in the plane. So, until the chair is put back together, you are at the mercy of people who will push you in a manual chair, which is often a difficult surrendering of independence. This is especially bad when you’re at the mercy of busy or otherwise uncaring airline employees who take for granted the ability to walk to the bathroom or the snack bar.
@jenjen, you know, @mizmoose already posted a link to the applicable regulations. For example, “Airlines must provide enplaning, deplaning and connecting assistance, including both personnel and equipment.” It doesn’t say “If airlines contract out this obligation, and the contractors don’t show up, the airline employees may instead sit around on their asses complaining about whose job it is.”
Geeziz. If anyone is really wondering why some people do not stop to help others, some of the commenters rushing to excuse Delta and blame the victim provide all the examples you need.
I *almost* booked a Delta flight on my last business trip, but took Southwest because it was slightly more convenient on the leg out. I’ll never, ever be booking Delta again, and will let them know that.
I’ve been a reader of this site for a long time but have never created an account do to the fact that I’ve never had anything to say. That was up until I read this. How could such a gross incompetence on the part of so many people be associated with an international brand. This is beyond unacceptable and it sickens me to think that there are people out there that have such a defect in their personality that they would neglect a person who so obviously needing assistance.
One wonders how their willingness to help other would be transformed if they had to go through just one day while in the shoes of a person of need.
Shame on you. *shakes my head*
I’ve been a reader of this site for a long time but have never created an account do to the fact that I’ve never had anything to say. That was up until I read this. How could such a gross incompetence on the part of so many people be associated with an international brand. This is beyond unacceptable and it sickens me to think that there are people out there that have such a defect in their personality that they would neglect a person who so obviously needed assistance.
One wonders how their willingness to help other would be transformed if they had to go through just one day while in the shoes of a person of need.
Shame on you. *shakes my head*
The last time I flew (this month) I wore huge ugly prescription knee braces and walked with a cane.
TSA treated me like dirt, but the airline folks went out of their way to help me. Twice employees with empty wheelchairs detoured to ask if I needed help, and other employees stopped several times to help me with my bags.
Of course, this wasn’t Delta.
its not my job isn’t an excuse… i’ve made it clear to my employees that if
i ever hear one of them utter something that sounds like “thats not my job”
then they had better start looking for a new one… that kind of behavior is
typical of people who choose the easy path, and let others make decisions
for them. those people have my sympathy though, because it isn’t easy
functioning as a peon. then again, i’ve worked really hard to develop a
career that provides me the lifestyle that i want to have, and i understand
that some people don’t care to better their situation… and even worse,
that there are people who want a better situation, and are aware of the
steps necessary to have that life, but are unwilling to do the things that
they have to do, to get there… and its not that i think that i am a
better person for doing what it takes… but i definitely have a better job
for having put forth that effort.
@drjayphd: if you’re talking about the man that got hit in hartford, apparently a cop only showed up because he was on his way somewhere else, but not because he had been called. either way, no one was bending down and helping him, or even stopping traffic to make sure he wasn’t struck again. but they did stop to take a look at him laying there.
@Pithlit: i stand partially corrected.
Do airline employees get punished for helping or something? I’ve heard this “it’s not my job” excuse before at the airport.
Having met quite few mouthbreathers who try to pass themselves off as actual human beings, I believe that this actually happened to her. I sympathize, as I have fibromyalgia… not as bad in that it’s not a progressive illness, but given that so few people truly know much about it, and its often deceptive outward appearance, I know how hard it is to get assistance… even when I’m in full body musculoskeletal pain, weak off my ass, pressure sensitive, and dealing with any other number of the symptoms. Air travel, as I found out, seems to aggravate the joint pain so severely that I’m in no shape to walk off the plane when it lands, even if I was okay walking on.
Luckily, I fly with Westjet, which is a discount coach airline in Canada (I believe they hope to branch out to the USA). Despite the loud children on my long-weekend flight, all of the Westjet staff were as pleasant and accommodating as the company claims they strive to be. They really went the extra mile with wheeling me where I needed to go and switching me to a more comfortable seating arrangement when I needed it. Delta could learn a thing or two from them.
I’m with neecy. As a hard-of-hearing person who must fly often for business, I know first-hand how illusory ANY idea of “assistance” will be when faced with gate agents.
I will approach the agents, tell them, “I am hard-of-hearing and cannot understand boarding announcements. I am sitting [pointing] THERE, and if there is a change to this flight, would you please let me know about it?” Then I go sit and stare at them from the closest possible location.
Which has gotten me absolutely nowhere a time or two. People with normal hearing can hardly make out gate announcements; those of us with a disability find it impossible.
Like neecy, I ask other passengers to advise me about announcements, and have always had a fairly positive response. I’m also alert and pay close attention to what is happening at the gate.
But it is tense and a little bit frightening. Still, I travel.
What steams my clams is having to deal with TSA when you can’t hear. Even though I carry a card to present to them [I AM HARD OF HEARING!!!] and TELL them, “Talk to the eyes, because the ears don’t hear you!”, I routinely have to cope with two responses.
First, I’m asked, “Who are you traveling with?” DUH … I guess the hard-of-hearing are so stupid that they can’t travel alone?
Second, doesn’t matter what I say, but when I’m pulled out for secondary screening (carry lots of tech, don’t you know), the screeners TALK TO MY BACK. Makes it very hard to cooperate. I just repeat, like a robot, “I want to cooperate. I am hard of hearing. I read lips. You need to face me to give me instructions. I want to cooperate …”
And it’s getting worse, sorry to say.
All this to get to West Palm Beach. What a waste of effort.
This past week, on my flight home from work, I witnessed a similar
incident. A handicapped elderly lady, sat in front of the gate
without someone to push her because there was no help available. The
lady at the counter, not her job apparently, did not lift a finger to
help her other than to tell her over the loudspeaker that she had 5
minutes to board before the gate was shut.
I didn’t even know her, but I felt bad, and helped her into the plane.
The flight attendant and pilots didn’t recognize me as an airline or
airport staff member, mentioned that I was waiting for a delayed
flight home, and that the least they could do was to show her some
respect and treat their (remaining) customers with class. They didn’t
apologize to the lady at the time, and got me a drink voucher at one
of the restaurants for being a good Samaritan.
The voucher infuriated me more than anything, because I would have
gladly left without any reward if they at least would treat the
disabled passenger with respect. Although it was not a Delta flight,
I still wrote to the airline in question (Hint: they have airways in
the united states).
I can only hope that if I were in her shoes that someone would do the
same for me. As for the poor person in this article, I hope justice
is served.
@Chune:
Chune, you are so right! This is just repulsive! How dare a suspected human being treat another one like an old shoe? If you’re late for work and you call to ask me to please go ahead and do the presentation you were supposed to give to the high level customers, THEN I can tell you “that’s not my job” because I’m receptionist, not your collegue. That a being in such situation answers like that to a person in need is telling me that yeas they’re a being, but not human. Shut, it is a matter of decency. If you don’t want to be decent, then just do it out of pitty for the poor woman, BUT DO IT.
What would have happened if that woman results to be the CEO wife or mother? I wan to hear your answer, Richard Anderson you attempt to CEO.
And to all those that dare to say “that’s not my job”, may this never happen to you, but if it does, may you live the rest of your life pained that you treated a poor woman like that.
that is absolutely terrible
Delta, take responsibility for this and admit fault.
@tinyrobot: It’s because Americans have no sense of honor.
If she did have to crawl anywhere, that’s just insane and the employees should pay for it for not helping her and not being competent human beings.
On the other hand, is there something about airport wheelchairs that prevents a person from wheeling themselves wherever they need to go? I’m assuming that since she could crawl, according to her, she had use of her arms/upper body.
I think the problem is that with almost every other industry, you can pay a premium – large or small – to receive a higher level of service. With airlines, the only way to receive a higher level of service is to fly business class all the time, and that is prohibitively expensive. If I had the choice between paying $400 for a flight and being treated like cattle, or $500 for a flight and being given some modicum of respect, I would pay $500 every single time. I know there are all sort of reasons why that wouldn’t work in the airline industry, but it at least makes my brain feel better as to why we all try to give airlines as little money as possible.
After having missed my Delta connection in Atlanta on July 21, I fully believe this woman’s account. The Delta employees in Atlanta simply do not care about their customers. Late flights and disrupted travel are so routine to the Delta employees there that no one matters. They don’t apologize for delays, and they truly have no compassion for anyone. They routinely treat people there like they are less than human, but this situation takes that a step further.
What is most frustrating to me is that Delta will eventually get close to going under and will request a bail out from the federal government claiming that the high cost of fuel drove them out of business. And we, the taxpayers, who they treated so poorly will give them even more money. Delta, like any other business who provides terrible customer service, should fail.
There is hope…My senior citizen husband was supposed to be met at Phoenix airport by an attendant with a wheelchair to take him to his connecting flight. After waiting some time, the co-pilot on his flight searched out a wheelchair and made sure he was helped to the very distant terminal and made his connection on time. This was certanily “not his job”. My husband and I are grateful for his kindness.
@floraposte: She had to use the stairs. The plane was not directly connected to a gate. She writes this specifically in the first part of her letter, which I edited for length.
what a horrendous story! However, I can’t imagine why a handicapped person would electively travel alone on America’s most craptastic customer support case study. It’s not her fault that she was surrounded by a bunch of narccistic pricks.. they (airline corps) don’t pay their employees enough to care. It’s really a shame that people have lost all sense of pride and dignity towards the jobs they do for fellow humans. As someone mentioned before, this symptom is pervasive in our society.. the disconnect is huge.
@Consumerist-Moderator-Roz:
@Aladdyn: Read the comment code – it’s on the front page right now, even! We don’t allow posts that only serve to blame the victim for their misfortune.
I have read it and i challenge you to expand on how my comment violated it. I stated that i didnt think that airlines are responsible for the care of disabled ppl who are not on their plane.
And I stated my desire to know if ppl are allowed to bring their own wheelchair onto the plane and if so, why someone who needed one would not have one.
This is not blaming, its asking, and someone on the forum answered my question stating that ppl are not allowed to use their own wheelchairs on the plane.
Posting helpful comments is fine, but it does not sound like you know enough about the situation to be helpful.
This would apply to 99.9% of the comments on any post here
@Aladdyn: I haven’t sorted through all the comments yet, but I think you had perfectly valid questions/comments and, in fact, the person who “answered” your question by telling you that people are not allowed to use their own wheelchairs on planes was 100% mistaken.
People who have wheelchairs bring those wheelchairs all the way up to the door of the aircraft. At the door, they are either placed on an aisle-chair (a little wheelchair that can fit down the aisle of the plane) or they walk (with assistance) to their seat. The process can take a while, which is why people with wheelchairs are boarded before everyone else.
Once the person in question is on board the aircraft, the wheelchair is gate checked. Gate checking is when the item is taken from the jetway and placed directly into the cargo hold and then, when the plane lands, brought from the cargo hold back up to the jetway. It’s the same thing that happens with strollers and car seats that are brought to the gate.
So, the only time a wheelchair bound person is without their wheelchair is when they are actually on the plane– the rest of the time they’ve got it with them.
And, if you read the article closely, you can see that the OP was NOT wheelchair bound– she “crawled” from the airport to the shuttle at 3:30 am because she didn’t have a ride… So, that means she didn’t check her wheelchair with her luggage and then pick it up at baggage claim– that means that she didn’t have her own wheelchair PERIOD.
I, like you, am skeptical about this story and rightfully so… It just doesn’t add up. It reads like a person who missed their connection and was super delayed and is now pissed about it– rightfully so. I’ve been delayed for hours and hours, gotten in at the middle of the night, missed my ride, and had to work the next morning on two hours of sleep to top it all off. You betcha I wanted blood!
But trying to spin this as “DELTA MAKES WOMAN WITH MUSCULAR DYSTROPHY CRAWL OFF PLANE!!!” is just plain wrong, ’cause that’s not the truth. If she was too disabled to push herself to the bathroom or the food court, wouldn’t she have had her own wheelchair to begin with?…
@itsgene: You’re right about the electric chair thing, and when I first read this, I was completely on her side (other than the 35 minute connection– what was she thinking?!), but when I reread the email, she said that she had to “crawl” to her shuttle from the airport because she no longer had a ride. Which means she didn’t have her own wheelchair, manual or otherwise, which makes this whole story not add up…
For people not in the know, if a passenger has an electric wheelchair or chart, it gets driven all the way up to the door of the aircraft and then taken apart and loaded in the storage hold. When the passenger reaches their FINAL destination, the chair is brought back to them right at the aircraft door. But if the passenger has a connection, they are transferred with a manual wheelchair and attendant.
If passenger doesn’t have use of their upper body, and has a long layover, they’re pretty much screwed. Without their motorized chair, they can’t get anywhere and the airline is most definitely not paying someone to stay and push them around. *Usually* they’ll be left near a gate agent so that they can let someone know if they need something, but that doesn’t always happen.
Generally, people in that situation travel with a friend/family member/or medical assistant. It sucks, but that’s reality…
However, in the OP’s situation, that doesn’t seem to be the case.
@maztec: It sounds like the new flight was SCHEDULED to leave at 10:22 pm. When they gave her the boarding pass, it had already taken a delay and wasn’t expected to leave until 12:55 am. And then, ultimately, it didn’t leave until 1:30 am.
@blue_duck: Unfortunately, Blue Duck, that is NOT the norm. I used to work for a major airline and we could see where every single passenger was coming from, when they were connecting, and if their flight was late– no matter what airline they were coming in from. We did NOT hold flights for anyone, even if it looked like they were only going to be five or ten minutes late. Why? For starters, delays are a trickle-down problem. Once a plane takes a delay, it snowballs out of control and it’s really hard to ever make up that time. Second, it’s not fair to the other passengers. No need delaying 150 people for the convenience of 1. Most importantly? The FAA fines airlines for delays. No way in hell is an airline going to willingly take a delay for a few passengers and risk having their on-time numbers thrown off and getting fines from the FAA. No way in hell. If I held a plane for a passenger, I would have been fired. Probably on the spot.
The person working the flight that she came in on probably saw that she only had 35 minutes to get from one end of the airport to the other AND that she was in a wheelchair. They knew she wasn’t going to make it one time, especially not if she needed help on the plane, so when it was time to close the flight, they closed it out without her. Knowingly.
Lesson? Don’t ever book a flight with a 35 minute connection. Flights BOARD 30 minutes prior to departure and CLOSE no less than 5 minutes to departure. That means when your inbound hits the tarmac, your outbound is already boarding. Even in the best case scenario, that connection is WAY too tight. If you require ANY sort of special assistance, it’s downright impossible.
@Rectilinear Propagation: No, the little wheelchair is only used for para/quadriplegics who cannot walk onto the plane. It’s called an aislechair and it’s small enough to fit down the aisle of the aircraft, plus it has no arms on it, so it’s easier to get the passenger in and out of the chair.
If a passenger has their own wheelchair, they HAVE to bring THEIR CHAIR all the way up to the door of the aircraft. At that point, they either walk onto the plane (with assistance) or they are brought onto the aircraft via aisle chair.
Their chair is placed in the cargo hold ONLY for the duration of the flight and then it is immediately brought back up to the jetway at their final destination AND at all connections. The only time a person is without their wheelchair is when they are on-board the aircraft.
So… If the OP needed the airline’s chair, that means she did NOT have her own wheelchair.
If the story we’re got here was completely true, this would be DISGUSTING. But… I’m pretty sure there are some massive holes.
My biggest problem with it? If the OP was disabled enough that she couldn’t walk to the bathroom or food court and couldn’t push her way around in the airline-owned/operated wheelchair, why didn’t she have her OWN chair? Preferably a motorized chair? How does she go to the normally go to the bathroom and get food to eat? Usually when people are *that* disabled, they’ll have developed the ability to take care of themselves and, if they can’t, they’ll plan for the trip and make reasonable accommodations.
I know that she didn’t have her own wheelchair because she said that she had to “crawl” from the terminal at 3:30 am to the shuttle because she didn’t have a ride– which also means that at some point she DID have a ride and that they decided not to come and get her because she got in so late. That part bothers me, too– you want more service from the airline than even your friends are going to give you? I mean, if you’re so disabled that you can’t push yourself in a wheelchair or walk to the bathroom, how are you able enough to crawl to the shuttle to get home? And if you’re that disabled, and unable to move around on your own, why wouldn’t your friends and family exhibit a little compassion and come and get you, 3:30 am or not?
Generally people who do NOT use a wheelchair in their day-to-day life will request a wheelchair at the airport to help out with what can, at times, be lengthy hikes. Those are usually elderly people or people dealing with a temporary disability (broken leg, etc…). Those chairs are intended for people who might have a hard time walking the distance that is sometimes required at the airport, but they aren’t a substitute for a motorized chair or an assistant, if that service is required by the passenger.
The airlines are obligated to get you from Point A to Point B and that INCLUDES getting you to, from, and between your gates. That does NOT include transporting you to the bathroom, to get food, etc…
That is what nurses and medical travel assistants are for. (They exist. Quadriplegics who have to travel alone use them all the time.) It is generally assumed that if you are one of the people that doesn’t NORMALLY use a wheelchair but got one just for the airport, you are at least mobile enough that you can get to the bathroom on your own. And if you’re always wheelchair-bound then, of course, you can get yourself to the bathroom, to the food court, etc…
In addition, like some other people already pointed out, a 35 minute connection is pretty unrealistic even in the BEST of scenarios. Airlines advise passengers of this, and request that people requiring special services plan accordingly. If the OP was requesting a wheelchair transport, she knew she’d be the last person off the plane. And she knew she was flying into ATL, a massive airport and DL’s hub. A sprint between the two ends of the airport can take a half-an-hour. Why, in God’s name, would you EVER book a 35 minute connection, knowing that this is the case?
It’s not unusual for there to be a shortage of wheelchair porters at an airline’s hub. Some flights have ten people on it all requesting transport, some have none. There are times when you’ve got 15 porters in one of the airport and it takes a while to get someone over to the other end. It was only 35 minutes from the time her flight landed until there was a porter there– that’s really not unreasonable, especially since it takes about 15 minutes to 25 minutes to get everyone off of a plane. She really only waited about 5-10 minutes for the porter to get there– and then decided not to wait?…
Plus, there were stairs. That adds time onto the process, as they usually have to wait until EVERYONE else is off and then MOVE the stairs and drive a cherry picker type thing over to the plane’s entrance. That can cause additional delays, especially if the cherry picker is being used somewhere else or if there are ramp delays– you have to get clearance before you just start moving around equipment.
If she was so disabled that she couldn’t get a drink of water or push the wheelchair to the bathroom, I just don’t understand how or why she’d crawl down a bunch of stairs. Honestly, I think they ONLY thing that Delta did wrong in this situation was when the flight attendants encouraged her to get off of the plane by herself. I fully believe that happened because I have seen it happen before. They cannot leave until all of the passengers are off of the plane and so, if they think someone is “faking” their disability, they’ll attempt to talk them into just walking off the plane rather than waiting for a wheelchair. And that’s just wrong.
Other than that… There’s the standard “I missed my flight and got home eight hours later than I’d planned to” complaint, which is valid but not really newsworthy and, really, the other part to take from this is a lesson in personal accountability…
I don’t know why we expect more from the airlines than we do any other service. We don’t expect grocery store clerks to push us around and take us to the bathroom, we don’t expect bellhops to wheel us to a restaurant. Why is air travel so different? They get you on the plane, they get you off the plane, they get you between the planes. And that’s where their responsibility ends. Everything beyond that is a special service and, as such, costs money.
Hey people! You shouldn’t blame the airline! You should blame the folks who work FOR the airline.
It’s not Delta’s fault they hired employees who refused to do their jobs well!
Wait…
@SteveZim1017: Other disabilities that they could exploit? Hmm, the blind, put them near an air conditioner, shake their chair a bit, and tell them that they are now at the new location, just think of the fuel savings!
[consumerist.com]
Remember this? If only we bothered our Congressmen and Senators, this women will get her justice. But she won’t because consumers have no rights in these cases.
JIC it hasn’t been said, the airport at west palm beach ( PBI ) is completely dead after around 11 PM; you can literally be in the terminal concourse completely alone, no security, no employees, maybe a few sleeping travelers.
This is a tragic story. Frankly, I am surprised that bystanders did not offer to help!
I had the misfortune to fly Delta twice a week between Atlanta and LGA for 10 months, and I am sad to say that this story does not surprise me. Delta has the rudest staff that I ever have had the misfortune to meet. And believe me, as a 100K mile per year or more traveler, I do know how to sweet talk my way onto flights, into first class, etc. The issue is that Delta employees are unhappy and some of them take it out on their clients.
And Jesus/Buddah/Allah (insert your own) wept…just wrong on so many levels.
I have never seen a bunch of people that worked harder at not working than the Delta employees in Atlanta
@Consumerist-Moderator-Roz: /clap…and not the STD
Thinking like a Delta spokesperson, I’d probably respond to this story with a statement containing the words “we’re committed”. A lot. In fact, the whole sentence should be made up of “We’re committed to”.
We here at Delta are committed to being committed to being committed to being committed to to being committed to being committed to to being committed to being committed to to being committed to being committed to to being committed to being committed to to being committed to being committed to to being committed to being committed to to being committed to being committed to pushing a disabled woman off a plane so that we can take off, but bickering about the extent to which we physically handle her.
“As an apology for your ordeal, you may check one additional bag at a discount of 50% of our current $50 fee. We hope you’ll remain committed as we are to being committed to offering you the most committed service in the skies. Committed.”
Doesn’t this situation reflect a violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act?
@Aladdyn: If you want to debate moderator actions, email me. It’s off topic and we’re not going to do them in threads.
@Fly Girl: You REALLY need to read the article before writing novel-like comments. Her flight was delayed which is what caused her to only have a 35 minute window between flights. This was not her fault in anyway as she had to rely on both the airport and Delta to get her to and from the flights. Try reading Delta’s own webpage [www.delta.com] about the wheelchair service. More detailed information here: [www.delta.com] but I’ll simplify it for you: They make you check your own wheelchair at the ticket gate (which means prior to security) and then they provide transport that you are not required to request in advance, but they like it if you do. They also say they are more than happy to accommodate your needs and help you out. I’d put money on the fact that she had her own wheelchair but was left stranded because guess what? If your flight is delayed and you miss a connecting flight then the wheelchair you’ve checked is on that flight and not with you. The end result is simple: clearly no one helped her and she needed assistance.
I really hope that you never have to face this kind of situation or that you never find yourself handicapped in any way, but I do hope that one day you have an ounce of sympathy and gain some perspective instead of writing ignorant comments on a website. If nothing else, try READING first.
Doesn’t surprise me. My girlfriend was injured on a Delta flight by a flight attendant who rammed a drink cart into her knee as fast as he possibly could (she had trouble walking for 3 days after). The crew pretended to be very nice (and then proceeded to try and get my girlfriend drunk by feeding her free drinks) until I said I wanted paramedics waiting at the gate when we arrived, after which point they did not even so much as look at us. We were told she would be wheeled out of the plane before anyone else (lie, I had to help her hop into the terminal on a single leg while the rest of the passengers filed out). Then we waited for paramedics for 45 minutes. They wouldn’t give me a copy of their report, and the Delta employees at the gate refused to give me a copy of THEIR paperwork. Basically I was told I could not have any documentation of what happened, so I took pictures of my girlfriend’s swollen knee and told the lady at the gate I was calling the police, at which point SHE said I was being unruly and said she would call the police ON ME. Long story short, nobody came, nobody gave a sh*t, and nobody from Delta even apologized. They are all bastards.
@Fly Girl: As far as I know, there’s no legal or even dictionary definition for the term “wheelchair bound” that insists it means somebody who can’t crawl–after all, no wheelchair user is in the thing 24/7, which is why many people object to the term as being imprecise anyway (I loved one guy’s definition as “like the song ‘Homeward Bound,” except there’s only one verse and you never stop singing”). I don’t think the fact that somebody can crawl off the plane changes an airline’s obligation to make sure they don’t have to try. And while I get that it’s not necessarily an employee’s job to take somebody to the food court or to the bathroom, I would find that a horrifying excuse for refusing and requiring a passenger to crawl or starve instead. It sounds like her starting airport (presumably a pretty small one if the aircraft needed stairs at Hartfield) was able to help her out just fine.
Something to chew on while steaming over Delta’s lack of compassion.
[www.disabilitytravel.com]