United to Family: Sit in Vomit or Get Off the Plane
Jeff Edwards April 17, 2015
A family says when they discovered that their assigned seating area was covered in vomit, rather than having the cabin cleaned, the United crew offered only a lecture, trash bags and a blanket to cover the sickening mess.
After a family vacation to Walt Disney World, the Shirley family found their United Airlines flight home to Washington, DC considerably less magical. The Shirleys told Daily Mail that shortly after the family of three found their seats on the flight departing from Orlando International Airport (MCO), it became evident that their assigned seating area was soaked in vomit.
Mayo Shirley became aware of the revolting situation when she retrieved a backpack containing snacks for her seven-year-old son Phoenix from under her seat and noticed the bag was wet.
“She then rubbed the carpet area on the floor of our seats and discovered the whole area was wet,” husband and father Scott Shirley said. “When she raised her hand towards her face to smell the liquid, that’s when she made the horrible discovery that the liquid was vomit.”
Even if the United flight crew had attempted to resolve the vile circumstances at this point, the Shirleys probably weren’t going to fondly remember their flight home from the Magic Kingdom, but they say what happened next only made a bad situation worse.
When the Shirleys complained, flight attendants admitted that a passenger on an earlier flight had gotten sick at their seats, but insisted that the seats had been cleaned. The Shirleys say the crew refused to clean the seats more thoroughly and instead offered a blanket to cover the puke soaked areas and plastic garbage bags to wrap their carry-on bags.
With Mayo Shirley in tears, the family was given a choice of waiting for a flight home the following day or enduring the barf-ridden seating arrangement. Scott Shirley says he was ready to wait for a vomit-free flight, but Mayo Shirley had to be at work the next day so the family felt they had no choice but to tough it out and remain in their current seats.
“The pilot came out and asked if a resolution had been made,” Scott Shirley explained. “He told us we had to make a decision because he can’t delay the other passengers.”
“The situation Mr Shirley described is certainly one that we wish no customer experiences, as our cleaners did not fully clean the seat area prior to departure,” a United Airlines spokesperson told the Daily Mail. “We offered them an alternate flight, but they decided to remain onboard. Our agents did the best they could in the short time they had to accommodate Mr Shirley and keep the flight on time.”
United offered each family member a $150 flight voucher and an undisclosed amount of frequent flyer miles to make up for their vomit-soaked nightmare in the friendly skies.
Scott Shirley says he considers the airline’s apology a feeble effort, “I personally feel it is a slap in the face considering all we had to endure on this two hour flight from hell.”
[Photo: Scott Shirley via DailyMail]
This is unacceptable in the modern world and these seats should have been taken out of service. Until you experience this situation you do not what it is like. I had this happen to me, was offered no recourse and the next evening I was sick. This is a bio hazard situation, you do not know why the person vomited or if they might be contagious like Noro virus or worse. Never again would I stay on the plane if my seat was like compromised! I would expect significant compensation, including lost wages if appropriate.
Sorry Captric, The pilot is authorized to delay the flight for bio-hazards such as vomit. At that point it should be cleaned. United had so many options, yet they chose to only be concerned about a fine for being delayed. The proof is in their statement.
Americans make me laugh sometimes. So what would anybody here do if they were showed up last for the cheapest seats on the airplane? Facts - people get sick on airplanes and vomit for a lot of different reasons. You cant take the seat out and replace it in anything LESS than a couple hours as they come out in ROWS. There are not EXTRA rows of seats for EVERY aircraft at EVERY airport. So the cleaners clean the seats as much as possible and THEN - you either accept the seats or you catch another flight or another form of public transportation or charter your own personal jet or buy an airplane and learn to fly it where you will get to clean the seats YOURSELF when people get sick. You are entitled to a safe flight at near the speed of sound to your destintion and that's about it folks. Oh- and WEBFLYER above --- the Captain only has "operational control" and command authority over the aircraft AFTER the doors are closed. He has responsibility for SAFETY from the preflight briefing to the postflight debriefing. Since a wet seat has NOTHING o do with safety it is out of the Captains hands except to voluntarily support the efforts to get the OTHER 150 people to their connections.
Why do these reps always use the word 'accomadate' when it was clearly the airlines problem. They paid for a clean seat on a safe airplane. There was no accomadating these poor people, they asked them to sit in VOMIT! That is unacceptable and they need a full refund and a credit for another flight that does not have any blackout BS.
Seems to me that the airline should have made the decision to not use those seats. Reduce the seating in the cabin, offer VDBs or force IDBs if reducing the seating causes the flight to become oversold.