gardengirl

This thread is old news but it has brought up some questions:

If the passenger was taken from the plane because the crew deemed him unfit to fly I wonder what made them conclude it was due to intoxication as opposed to, let's say, have the flu, ate tainted food, etc. It seems there must have been something that made them come to this conclusion.

But without going to all the different scenarios let's just say it was over drinking, over eating and over delay to get to the gate. All of these would be a lack of discernment on the part of the passenger which led to the removal. By his own admission it was a failure to be discerning with all three. He's been removed for good reason. The crew's responsibility seems to be to get passengers settled and get the plane to a stage for departure. In his first post the passenger says he was told ". . . and that I'll be taken care off (OP's misspelling) at the gate." It would be common sense that it's not really the part of the crew to ask if he felt better or assess if he's now well enough to be fit to fly. Yes, you can feel better after vomiting but then the ailment can be ongoing and you will find yourself back in that blackhole needing to vomit again. In their short time to prepare the plane for departure they needed to get him to the gate for any assessment of what was going on with him. At this stage let's call him Passenger A.

Here's my questions:

First, the flight is at 5 p.m. We've been told about the undiscerning behavior of the passenger during +/- the 2 hours before the flight. Because of this, I can't help but to question what other eating and drinking behavior took place earlier in the day.

The ground agents can assess it was the inclusion of alcohol to the situation that made the passenger unfit to fly. By his own admission there's no argument from the passenger about that. But let's say it was just overeating? Wouldn't any failure to be discerning about how you're going to feel on a flight be enough reason for the airline to deny flying? Would it be reasonable to eat a quart of collards shortly before a flight just because you had a craving for it and expect fellow passengers and crew to deal with the consequences? Or that it was the running to the plane that caused the vomiting? If the passenger has just landed on a delayed LOT connection and had to run that would be a different situation. But it wasn't. The passenger was in the lounge waiting until the last possible minute to get to the gate. By his own words he said he knew it was Gate 44 at the end of the airport. So the ground personnel deem the ticket invalid because of actions on the part of the passenger. Case closed. No need for arguing. No need for discussion. As the FA said, he was "taken care off at the gate." End of story for Passenger A.

Now as Passenger B he returns to buy a ticket. The ticket agent is selling tickets. Not necessarily assessing fitness to fly. That's for others at the gate and on the flight. He buys ticket. Because of recent events he has enough discernment during flight to forego the offer of wine and makes it to work. Had he vomited again on the outset of this flight, Passenger B would once again have reasonably been declared as unfit to fly.