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MSNBC: Petite woman bumped from plane for hefty passenger



 
 
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  #1  
Old July 26th, 2010, 11:42 PM posted to soc.support.fat-acceptance,misc.consumers,rec.travel.air,rec.travel.usa-canada,misc.consumers.frugal-living
Penny
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Posts: 1
Default MSNBC: Petite woman bumped from plane for hefty passenger

http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/384141...y-todaytravel/

Petite woman bumped from plane for hefty passenger

5-foot-4 woman lost her seat so that late-arriving passenger could have two

by Michael Inbar
TODAYshow.com contributor
updated 7/26/2010 12:50:49 PM ET

It’s irritating enough to get bumped from a flight. If you are already
seated on that flight, having to walk off the plane adds a little
indignity.

But to be told to leave a plane because a too-large passenger needs two
seats? It turned into a seeing-red, head-scratching moment for one frequent
flyer.

A female sales rep (who requested anonymity in interviews) revealed her
strange tale to the Sacramento Bee, relating how she was asked to vacate
her seat aboard a Southwest Airlines flight shortly before the plane was
set to leave Las Vegas for Sacramento last week.

The woman, a petite 5-foot-4, 110 pounds, said she was flying standby when
agents sold her the last seat available on the plane. She had already
stowed her bags and was settling into her seat when an attendant told her
she had to leave immediately.

When she was told her seat was needed because a late-arriving passenger’s
girth was too wide for just one, she had some questions.

“It didn’t seem right that I should leave to accommodate someone who had
only paid for one seat,” the woman told the Sacramento Bee. But she was
even more upset because, she said, airline staff acted rudely and
inconsiderately when she asked for a further explanation.

Southwest regrets how the situation was handled, according to airline
spokeswoman Marilee McInnis. “We know that this was awkward and we should
have handled it better,” she told the Sacramento Bee.

While saying the airline plans to apologize to the bumped passenger,
McInnis said Southwest staff may have acted more swiftly than usual in
booting her because the overweight passenger in question was only 14 and
they were trying to spare the teen embarrassment.

Southwest Airlines has been kicking up controversy about weighty issues
lately — earlier this year, renowned “Clerks" director/actor Kevin Smith
was bumped from a Southwest flight because he was too big to fit into one
seat.


  #2  
Old July 27th, 2010, 12:43 AM posted to soc.support.fat-acceptance,misc.consumers,rec.travel.air,rec.travel.usa-canada,misc.consumers.frugal-living
Kurt Ullman
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Posts: 1,653
Default MSNBC: Petite woman bumped from plane for hefty passenger

In article ,
Checkmate wrote:

Only 14, and already a fat slob... disgusting. Also, if the passenger was
late
enough that they reassigned her seat to a standby passenger, that decision
should have been irreversible. If you can't get there on time, that's on
you.


Yeah but since he seemed to be flying alone, I am sure that SW did not
want the liability associated with keeping an eye on the 14 y/o (let
alone the cost of feeding him) until the next flight.

--
I want to find a voracious, small-minded predator
and name it after the IRS.
Robert Bakker, paleontologist
  #3  
Old July 27th, 2010, 06:27 AM posted to soc.support.fat-acceptance,misc.consumers,rec.travel.air,rec.travel.usa-canada,misc.consumers.frugal-living
Mxsmanic
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Posts: 5,830
Default MSNBC: Petite woman bumped from plane for hefty passenger

Penny writes:

The woman, a petite 5-foot-4, 110 pounds ...


For what it's worth, the average height for women in the U.S. is 5 feet 4
inches, so she's not petite.

... because the overweight passenger in question was only 14 and
they were trying to spare the teen embarrassment.


Sparing the teen embarrassment will result in her weighing about three times
as much when she's 35, just before she dies of diabetic complications and
cardiovascular disease.
  #4  
Old July 27th, 2010, 04:45 PM posted to rec.travel.usa-canada
Dymphna[_37_]
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Posts: 1
Default MSNBC: Petite woman bumped from plane for hefty passenger


I think this was a no win situation.


--
Dymphna
Message origin: TRAVEL.com

  #5  
Old July 28th, 2010, 04:01 AM posted to rec.travel.air,rec.travel.usa-canada,misc.consumers.frugal-living
SteveHorn[Caduceus]ForgingAsGrosvenor
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Default MSNBC: Petite woman bumped from plane for hefty passenger


MSNBC: Petite woman bumped from plane for hefty passenger

Most sensible airlines, REFUSE TO ALLOW late-arrivibg passengers to board -
usually 20 minutes before taking off.

In other wordsd, lardbuckets should not have been allowed boarding, let alone
forcing an already boarded passengerr out of her seat.

On Mon, 26 Jul 2010 19:43:21 -0400, Kurt Ullman wrote:
In article ,
Checkmate wrote:


Only 14, and already a fat slob... disgusting. Also, if the passenger was late
enough that they reassigned her seat to a standby passenger, that decision
should have been irreversible. If you can't get there on time, that's on
you.


Yeah but since he seemed to be flying alone, I am sure that SW did not
want the liability associated with keeping an eye on the 14 y/o (let
alone the cost of feeding him) until the next flight.


  #6  
Old July 30th, 2010, 02:34 AM posted to soc.support.fat-acceptance,misc.consumers,rec.travel.air,rec.travel.usa-canada,misc.consumers.frugal-living
aemeijers
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Posts: 49
Default MSNBC: Petite woman bumped from plane for hefty passenger

Mxsmanic wrote:
Penny writes:

The woman, a petite 5-foot-4, 110 pounds ...


For what it's worth, the average height for women in the U.S. is 5 feet 4
inches, so she's not petite.

... because the overweight passenger in question was only 14 and
they were trying to spare the teen embarrassment.


Sparing the teen embarrassment will result in her weighing about three times
as much when she's 35, just before she dies of diabetic complications and
cardiovascular disease.


Some of them hang on for an amazingly long time. There is one in my
office, probably around my age (early 50s) that has to weigh twice what
I do, and I'm no lightweight, and am close to a foot taller. First met
her 30 years ago when I started, when she was maybe 75 pounds lighter.
ISTR the clinical term is 'morbidly obese'. I never expected her to make
it past 40.

But yeah, 14 and fat is still mostly the parent's fault. A fat 14 was,
in all odds, at least a chunky 8 year old. In my experience, fat kids,
more often than not, have fat parents, and get their dietary/exercise
habits from them. So the parents are in denial that the kid has a
problem, and usually have plenty of crap food around the house.

And save your flames- I am borderline fat myself (Just a big gut,
thankfully), so I know what it is like to be food-dependent, with a
mother with too many kids who used food to shut us up so she could get
some work done. But at least I'm not sliding any further into the hole,
and occasionally make it a little ways back up the hill.

--
aem sends...



--
aem sends....
  #7  
Old July 30th, 2010, 11:22 AM posted to soc.support.fat-acceptance,misc.consumers,rec.travel.air,rec.travel.usa-canada,misc.consumers.frugal-living
Gordon Burditt[_12_]
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Posts: 8
Default MSNBC: Petite woman bumped from plane for hefty passenger

The woman, a petite 5-foot-4, 110 pounds ...

For what it's worth, the average height for women in the U.S. is 5 feet 4
inches, so she's not petite.

... because the overweight passenger in question was only 14 and
they were trying to spare the teen embarrassment.


What kind of ticket did the teen have? The passenger bumped was
flying standby. I'm guessing that you can't get child-flying-alone
standby tickets. The teen might have been late for a number of
reasons not his fault, such as a connecting flight being late, or
the airline screwed up in getting him to the connecting flight on
time.

Sparing the teen embarrassment will result in her weighing about three times
as much when she's 35, just before she dies of diabetic complications and
cardiovascular disease.


Does it also give him a sex-change operation? The teen in question was
14 and *male*. It's also unclear that much of the embarrassment had
anything to do with his weight.

  #8  
Old July 30th, 2010, 12:09 PM posted to soc.support.fat-acceptance,misc.consumers,rec.travel.air,rec.travel.usa-canada,misc.consumers.frugal-living
Mxsmanic
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 5,830
Default MSNBC: Petite woman bumped from plane for hefty passenger

Gordon Burditt writes:

Does it also give him a sex-change operation? The teen in question was
14 and *male*.


All of the sources I've seen refer to the fat teenager as female.
 




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