Air NZ crew heads home alone after LA suicide

Hilary wrote:

Fine - the point remains, people "get upset" about all kinds of things,


all


the time. If the airline is going to cancel flights over it - on safety,
humanitarian, or karmic grounds - they should ensure enough redundancy to
cover these out-of-the-blue contingencies (unlike weather or mechanical).


No Transportation Company can have a plan for everything. That was a 1 in a
million shot. People who were inconvenienced by this just have to shake it
off, and go on with their lives. I've been delayed hundreds of times, for
hundreds of reasons. It happens. That's life.


Exactly my point, my friend. People expect, and make allowances for, and
forgive, the delays inherent in air travel due to the vagaries of the method
- mechanical delays, weather delays, etc. This is especially true when the
airline is up front about it (e.g. how often have we shrugged off "flight
canceled" and how often have we been ticked when there are a series of six
consecutive "one hour" delays?).

If, conversely, the airline is going to cancel a flight because of a
particular policy ("we won't make you fly because you had a close
encounter"), it is incumbent upon the airline to make it right by its pax.

We all have stress from various sources at various times. Do we get to
knock off work (including in the airline industry) because we had a fight
with a spouse or the dog died or.....



If it makes you unable to do your job and potentially putting you or
others in a dangerous situation, then yes.

Hilary



Recently (like 3 days ago) I had the occasion to hear Air NZ cancel a
flight from Wgnt due to crew illness and that was that, no other
explanations.

Mr Scebe wrote:
Not at all. By having no passengers on-board it would have allowed the crew
to at least get some rest knowing that they could deal with matters in
privacy - they would have taken seats in First and Business Class, most
would have slept as much as possible. Having passengers on board - even a
few - would have meant that they couldn't just spread out and "go tropo" if
required.

But if you have the traumatized crew kept together with nothing to do,
wouldn't it be worse ?

Having a few pax (I am thinking less than 50) would have given each FA during
the two shifts a bit of a distraction to take their minds away from the
traumatic experience while still giving plenty of time (and private space) for
the FAs to consider their condition and experience.

"matt weber" wrote in message
...

It is complex, but if they had to fly a crew in, the delay would
probably have been 24 hours or more, meanwhile, you do have the
aircraft slated to go somewhere else from Auckland. In terms of
revenue, it may be better to send the aircraft home empty and just pay
for one planeload of displaced passengers instead of two.

There are crews in LAX who could have been brought out to cover for the
flight, and potentially swapped with the affected crew, giving Air NZ time
to position another crew to cover for them.

Though what everyone is not taking into account is that Air NZ has one of
the most sophisticated crew rostering systems in the world, and has higher
utilisation rates than most other airlines. The disruption to the roster
from an event like this would be enormous. It would have been cheaper and
easier to do what they did.

--
Mr Scebe
Losers always whine about their 'best'.
Winners go home and **** the prom queen".
~Sean Connery in "The Rock"

in article , CollectorNZ at
wrote on 3/2/04 4:54 AM:

Mr Scebe wrote:

"Alan" wrote in message
...



Yeah, I can see it in the training manual now:

"Procedures to be Followed When a Human Body Falls from the Sky onto
Cabin Crew Transport.

1. Remove body.
2. Clean windscreen thoroughly before proceeding.
3 ...."



4. Check appearance.



And do not alarm passangers or they will demand free stuff


Didn't one of the major airlines just dress up a decedent and place him in a
seat just recently?

in article , budgie at
wrote on 3/2/04 1:29 AM:

On Tue, 02 Mar 2004 01:26:21 GMT, Raffi Balmanoukian
a wrote:

in article , Jim Davis Sr. at
wrote on 3/1/04 9:09 PM:


"Raffi Balmanoukian" a
wrote in message
news:BC68DDEF.214AE%walkabout@TAKEOUTTHETRASHTOREP LY.ns.sympatico.ca...

As for suing....NZ should consider going after the estate of the deceased
for all of its damages, including the dent in the van 8-)

Go after the Estate? Oh Gawd! The guy probably had nothing, or very
little.

Not if he had insurance payable to his estate.

which in all probability had a suicide exception.

Most policies (not all) not after the first two years. Most, however, DO
have a "death in the commission of an offence" exception which could very
well apply.

in article , John Ewing at
none@needed wrote on 3/2/04 1:19 AM:


"Raffi Balmanoukian" a
wrote in message news:BC696E24.21516%

Balancing the equities, the innocent pax/airline deserves any
resources over those of the alleged widows and orphans.

That's real cute ... social equity obviously isn't factored into your
equation.

My son had an accident at the beach seven years ago which resulted in him
becoming a quadriplegic. One person did suggest we sue the beach patrol for
his misadventure. I am sure some lawyer would take on such a case, but most
certainly not on our behalf.

We all recognise it as just simple damn bad luck. Accidents do happen.

John




This was no accident. It was a suicide. Your son deserves empathy and, if
it had been (say) at a swimming pool with a faulty design (eg springboard
too high above too shallow a pool, or too close to the edge) that would well
be worth legal advice.

Jumping off a bridge, intentionally, into traffic is NOT the same as a beach
accident, or bad luck to the decedent. It's bad luck to the witnesses who
were in the wrong place at the wrong time - which is exactly my point, that
balancing the rights of those innocents with the suicide's families, my
empathy is very much more with the former.

Raffi Balmanoukian muttered....



Fine - the point remains, people "get upset" about all kinds of
things, all the time. If the airline is going to cancel flights over
it - on safety, humanitarian, or karmic grounds - they should ensure
enough redundancy to cover these out-of-the-blue contingencies (unlike
weather or mechanical).



Obviously, the cockpit crew "felt" well enough to operate the a/c for the
long flight, not omitting for their own safety any of the care and routine
which they would have observed had the seats been full.

Therefore, someone in authority seems to have made a decision (likely and
almost inevitably at least partially sexist) that the cabin crew's
traumatic experiece had rendered them hors de combat or marginally below
the requisite level of performance serving passenger needs.

Catering to the supposedly tenderer sensibilities of the cabin crew, surely
mostly female (and with a good chance that one or more of the males among
them might be light in his loafers), the line provided them a free ride,
while forcing the cockpit slaves to function almost as if they had not been
in the van projectilized by the falling body.

The cockpit crew obviously needs a well-trained advocate to represent them,
discriminated against as they so obviously have been.

By Golly, equitable work rules require that a rested crew (complete) be on
hand at every flight termination point, ready to address the results of
this sort of potential traumatization.

;-Nudge,

TMO

Jim Davis Sr. muttered....



What I'm trying to say is that the "Estate", if any, that this guy has
left will probably not be sufficient for his surviving family to live
on for the rest of their lives. If the estate is sued, the innocent
survivors will be the ones to suffer. It's not their fault that he
decided to take a header off the bridge or building.



Would you concede the potential (and likely) liability of the deased's
estate had one or more of the sircrew been physically injured by the
falling body?

Physical injury is a tort. Mental anguish may also be a tort.

Then there are the side questions...

Was the aircrew "riding to work" actually in a duty status?

Or simply employees whose potential injuries would not have occurred in
"the line of duty" and for which the airline would not have been
responsible under the Workmen's Compensation Laws of most US states.

Would any legal attempts for the emplyees ro recover costs of treatement
and rehab from the airline be subject to California, US federal or New
Zealand law and courts? Obviously, any action by crew members or the
airline against the estate of the deceased would be in the California
courts.

Damn, lawyers, barristers and solicitors could keep this case alive for
decades, milking all concerned as if they were big-uddered Holsteins.

TMO

mtravelkay wrote:

15 years ago, while on a temp assignment in LA while working at IBM in
Austin. during the development of AIX/PS2 at Locus Software in the
Herbel Life building, I was staying at the Marriott LAX. One night a
bunch of us were coming back from dinner. In front of the hotel was a
body draped in a sheet. Apparently, someone jumped from the 14th floor,
presumably because there was no 13th floor.

If you correct for the American way of counting floors, would it be only
the 12th?

AKM wrote:

mtravelkay wrote:

15 years ago, while on a temp assignment in LA while working at IBM in
Austin. during the development of AIX/PS2 at Locus Software in the
Herbel Life building, I was staying at the Marriott LAX. One night a
bunch of us were coming back from dinner. In front of the hotel was a
body draped in a sheet. Apparently, someone jumped from the 14th
floor, presumably because there was no 13th floor.


If you correct for the American way of counting floors, would it be only
the 12th?


I was assuming he was American and clueless, with no idea that Americans
number building levels differently. He probably has never heard of
Celsius, or the Metric System and believes the dollar always gets stronger.