Originally Posted by
kentflyer
Chicaloca,
This is being directed at United because it was an United GA who called in the three airport goons to administer the beatdown to an elderly doctor. In all my years of flying, I've found Delta to be especially gracious in these situations and American to be pretty helpful. United's rude "us vs them" approach to IDB/VDB situations is what drove this situation and the violent beatdown that resulted.
Then the United GA lied in a written incident report and said Dr. Dao "struck an officer". That lie was repeated by CEO Munoz in his communication to United employees. A corporate culture that has led to lies like this and the beatdown of an elderly doctor is why United, not Republic, is being called to account.
Thank you for clarifying that. Those are details I'd missed in the information overload that was this story.
My perception of the story has always been that each entity shared at least some degree of blame for this:
United for not handling this before boarding
Republic for apparently not providing adequate notice of the need for the 4 seats for its crew
The police for unnecessary roughness
The doctor for resisting the direction of the crew which many of us know from flying is the law of the land once one steps foot on a plane.
The GA's at ORD are definitely not among the most friendly and this post certainly shifts more blame on to United than I'd previously placed.
The whole thing is just such an embarrassing mess, and no doubt Delta is grateful because its drawn out recovery from the Georgia storms really took a backseat.