I was on an ATL-BOS flight in March. I had 21A, my mom had 21C, and there was this lady in 21B. After my mom was talking to her a lot, it was figured out that she was traveling to BOS because of a death in her family. She was notified of the death on a Sunday, and was flying the next day for services on Tuesday. It was DL1868 (before the flight # switch for BOS-ATL-BOS flights) that was doing JAX-ATL-BOS (and she said she was from north Florida - no idea if she came from JAX since once it got to ATL it was delayed. She said that she hates flying and doesn't do it a lot.

My question/concern and reason for starting this thread is about the seating.

21B is a preferred seat (standard 752). I was wondering...is DL flexible with seating passengers, as in putting them in a preferred seat when they are not a medallion, when there is unexpected last-minute travel like in this case?