Originally Posted by
BruceLynn
Bocastephen - So you are proposing that the reason for the turnaround was not security but mindless adherence to rules which much say that any plane with undocumented passengers must return to departure airport. Does any one has any insight as to whether this is an actual Air Nippon policy?
If security was an imminent issue - meaning, the extra person was deemed to have nefarious intent and calls back to LAX ops could not sort out their ticket or what happened, then in that case, a diversion to the nearest airport would be needed after restraining the person and immobilizing them...absent an imminent security threat, for example a stowaway getting a free ride, or a passenger mixup, or even someone who tried to move from the UA flight to the NH flight, the more reasonable approach would be to continue to Tokyo and let the Japanese authorities handle the situation. I can't access the original flight plan, but if the polar route was planned to go up to Alaska then across the Bering and down, then they could have stopped in ANC to remove the extra person vs turning around 4hrs in and go back to LAX and treat the entire flight as a security issue, or if they went straight across, a diversion to HNL may have been possible - but that is the inflexible and rigid mindset that results in a mess like this - the inability or unwillingness to assess the situation from different angles and figure out the right approach that balances the needs of everyone involved (ie, the other 300+ people on the flight). Very few of the LA staff thought this was a necessary result.