Originally Posted by
Schultzois
Certainly much better to go after the party that created the situation, which would be BA first by downgrading and/or denying travel to part/all of the travel party, and second by choosing to return to the gate even though there were ways that could have facilitated an on-time departure.
I suspect BA would (a) point to their conditions of carriage that permit them both to offload and downgrade, (b) argue that Mr. Banner's behavior in response, was a break in the chain of causation and (c) if Mr Banner had indeed failed to follow the lawful instructions of the crew during taxi, that was a criminal offence, (even though they chose not to follow this through) and at that point the pilot had no option other than to return.
Prospect of successfully suing BA? I'd say Nil.