Watch: Flyer Renders Disruptive Seat Mate Unconscious as Ryanair Pax Cheer
Jeff Edwards September 14, 2017
A passenger on a Ryanair flight from Spain to the UK, took matters into his own hands and knocked out an obnoxious seat mate before police got a chance to take the troublemaker away.
A Ryanair passenger is being hailed as a hero on social media after video emerged, showing the fed-up flyer taking down a disruptive passenger several years his junior. The silver-haired passenger on the flight from Girona–Costa Brava Airport (GRO) to London Luton Airport (LTN) had apparently had enough of his seat mate by the time the plane landed and when the misbehaving passenger refused to cooperate with the crew, the elder flyer quickly put an end to the back-and-forth.
Video obtained by Fox News shows the senior citizen effortlessly placing the defiant 22-year-old in a chokehold. A few seconds later, the younger man quickly loses consciousness as loud cheers erupt from the cabin.
“Over the course of the flight, he was singing loudly with his headphones on,” passenger Dean Whiteside told The Sun. “It was a late flight, everyone was tired and he was rubbing people up the wrong way. I could see it brewing up. That’s the reason I got my phone out, ready to film it.”
Eyewitnesses say that the disruptive passenger didn’t show any signs of mending his ways just because police were called to meet the plane when it arrived at the gate. The young traveler reportedly responded to crew instructions to stay in his seat by standing up and shouting, “get out of my face.” At this point, the nearby traveler dispatched a quick dose of vigilante justice.
“The guy was lifeless in his arms like a rag doll,” Whiteside recounted to reporters. Police arrived a few moments later (after all the excitement was already over) to collect the unconscious passenger.
“A 22-year-old man from Dagenham was arrested on suspicion of common assault and being drunk on an aircraft,” Bedfordshire Police later confirmed. “He was taken into police custody and dealt with by way of simple caution.”
[Photo: Shutterstock]
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@IanFromHKG: very well said! "_Proportionate_ response" is the key (and not just for other passengers but also for the airline employees and law enforcement), and that is often hard to judge.
@bhrubin: So, what's the extent of "being taken out"? How far does it go? E.g. would it be acceptable that "In today's world, _any_ douchebag" could be lynched on the plane just for public nuisance?
highflyer66, the distinction here is that United didn't "allow" something to occur, they "caused it' to occur highflyer66 and eng3, contrary to popular misconception, under common law applicable both in the UK and the Republic of Ireland, assault doesn't involve physical contact - it is an attempt to engage physically or a threat to do so. From my viewing of the video, our silver-haired friend did neither of these - he just engaged. There was no sign I could see that he made a threat, or put the youth in fear of an attack. So if anything, it was battery (a term that eng3 did use) From a UK/Irish common law perspective, in the absence of a threat/attempt (assault), the question is whether the physical contact was lawful, for which relevant factors (there are others!) are whether the youth represented a threat, whether the elderly gentleman's response was designed to address that threat, and whether it was proportionate. The authorities seem to have taken the view that the youth's behaviour was not sufficiently reprehensible for him to face criminal proceedings (he was given a caution). One might be at liberty to presume in consequence that the chokehold was a disproportionate response to the supposed threat. However, there is no suggestion that the authorities (perhaps still in magnanimous mood) went on to treat the chokeholder as an unlawful attacker. But all this is supposition. However, passengers would be advised to be very careful about getting directly involved. Situations are rarely clearcut, versions of events rarely agree, video is often only taken at a late stage where its usefulness to describe events leading to an incident is wide open to attack (relevant to questions of motive, justification, proportionate response etc), and so forth. I think many of us would love to be seen as have-a-go-heroes (myself included) - but it is rarely a safe course of action, physically or legally
that older guy looks calm as - bet he's ex military possibly ex sf
For everyone worried about the drunk guy possibly suffering injury from the chokehold: you have a point. But not a point big enough, unfortunately, to deter scores of other passengers and crew and fellow travelers from applauding the actions of the older passenger applying the chokehold. The 22 year old was a menace and a threat on an airplane. He has to take responsibility for being a threat on an airplane. In today's world, any douchebag threat or menace on an airplane will be summarily taken out without mercy, The lesson here is simple: don't be a douchebag,