No answers, no explanations for B.C. couple escorted off Montreal plane
Jun 22, 22, 7:22 pm
#61
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Originally Posted by NY-FLA
My reflective take on this is that I sincerely hope the Captain has more measured, grounded judgement when making flight deck decisions.
Let’s try some empathy. With the captain.
if there is anything the last few years have proved it is the misanthropes are right. So, hypothetically, the FA says they have a bunch of noncompliant (with masking or Covid protocol) pax. You are the captain. Do you engage and ask them to mask and wait to see if they do, and continue to do so? Or do you say GTFO? I certainly can’t blame him for supporting his team (the FA). And yes it does seem like somebody messed up and cast too wide a net; but at the same time I am extremely sympathetic to a captain that just wanted to fly and not deal with unruly pax and not further contribute to an already abysmal OT performance record.
I am just speculating like everybody else in this thread but have some sympathy for the captain and crew that have had a terrible few years. Epically terrible.
I loathe the flying experience right now. Loathe it deeply. That doesn’t mean I think the rules don’t apply to me. Completely the opposite.
Jun 22, 22, 7:45 pm
#62
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Originally Posted by ridefar
So, hypothetically, the FA says they have a bunch of noncompliant (with masking or Covid protocol) pax. You are the captain. Do you engage and ask them to mask and wait to see if they do, and continue to do so? Or do you say GTFO? I certainly can’t blame him for supporting his team (the FA).
I believe a UA pilot FTer described it that way, though I could be misremembering.
The captain may have had the final decision, but they were almost certainly not the one who really made the "decision".
Jun 22, 22, 7:51 pm
#63
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Originally Posted by canadiancow
AFAIK it always works that way. If a FA says "this person can't fly", the captain always goes along with it, because otherwise it would create too much tension in the air.
I believe a UA pilot FTer described it that way, though I could be misremembering.
The captain may have had the final decision, but they were almost certainly not the one who really made the "decision".
I believe a UA pilot FTer described it that way, though I could be misremembering.
The captain may have had the final decision, but they were almost certainly not the one who really made the "decision".
We are on the same page. But some people seem to not know this and or feel the captain should be personally liable. I was trying to gently refute that (meaning not call somebody stupid which I might normally be inclined to do).
Jun 22, 22, 8:14 pm
#64
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One thing t seems lacking in all the reports I have read is any discussion / orders given by the crew to the alleged miscreants. It seems the firs and only action to resolved the perceived issue was to call in the police. I guess if any of the passengers were in the wrong we'll hear about, if ACA were wrong the matter will go silent.
Do the police just act on ACA's word that these people are trouble makers and need to be evicted without doing any due diligence themselves??
Do the police just act on ACA's word that these people are trouble makers and need to be evicted without doing any due diligence themselves??
Jun 22, 22, 8:20 pm
#65
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Originally Posted by ex-egll
Do the police just act on ACA's word that these people are trouble makers and need to be evicted without doing any due diligence themselves??
Jun 22, 22, 10:04 pm
#66
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Originally Posted by stevendorechester
There was a couple from Ottawa who had nothing to do with this group.
They were removed and were not told why. If they truly did nothing wrong then they should be entitled to sue the employee who made the decision as well as Air Canada.
They were removed and were not told why. If they truly did nothing wrong then they should be entitled to sue the employee who made the decision as well as Air Canada.
Are they entitled to sue - sure, they could try. Will their case go anywhere - probably not. At least in Canada.
Absent of any malice on AC's part, they would need to prove some form of immediate or lasting material harm. And I doubt the effort would be worth whatever this cost them out of pocket.
Jun 22, 22, 10:50 pm
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I could pretty easily justify a 24 hour delay costing me lowish 4 figures. How much is a small claims filing in.... Oh I have no idea how the Quebec legal system works.
Jun 22, 22, 11:09 pm
#68
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Unnecessarily missing the funeral of a relative (the wife of the BC couple) would seem to have the potential of significant emotional harm.
Jun 23, 22, 1:33 am
#69
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The version I've heard from a UK member of staff for Menzies, the ground handling agent, is that it was indeed weight / balance issue when the ground handlers in Montréal were unable / unwilling to offload cargo or baggage immediately. Given the ticking clock, the captain had to remove a certain weight quickly, and passengers were selected instead of baggage. Somehow this got communicated to ground staff as passengers were disruptive as opposed to disrupted (language issue?) and the police were called to assist. It wouldn't surprise me if the police and ground staff weren't fully informed either, that seems to be the over-riding issue here, very poor communications, and the ground staff at YUL filled in the gaps with the usual reason people are offloaded without notice. Plus the rather awkward issue about baggage handling. I guess I should point out that this is inevitably a third hand account, so I'm not 100% sure about this.
It kind of stands to reason, in that while you may get one or two people with mask issues who get into a wrangle with cabin crew, you may get at a pinch a problem with a larger group of travellers (see Lufthansa's recent mega clanger), realistically you are not going to get 10 - 20 different and unrelated travellers or groups of travellers all in trouble within a relatively short period with the limited number of crew on this aircraft. What is more likely is that all the passengers did not have status on the manifest and did not have on-carriage arrangements, which would have been messy to resolve, they just needed 30 bodies. There may have been a requirement to take people from certain parts of the aircraft. The lack of staff at Montréal meant that a friendly and helpful rebooking service was not provided, and I am guessing the word was out that they were disruptive. It's common practice to avoid an argument with offloaded passengers while sat with other passengers, whatever the reason, so the usual protocol is to say "we can discuss this outside the aircraft but the captain has told me that you are not flying, and I don't have any more information right now".
The London ground handlers found a few unattended bags in the cabin in London after disembarkation, in addition to the unclaimed bags, which caused a security event at the London end for which the Metropolitan Police were called.
It kind of stands to reason, in that while you may get one or two people with mask issues who get into a wrangle with cabin crew, you may get at a pinch a problem with a larger group of travellers (see Lufthansa's recent mega clanger), realistically you are not going to get 10 - 20 different and unrelated travellers or groups of travellers all in trouble within a relatively short period with the limited number of crew on this aircraft. What is more likely is that all the passengers did not have status on the manifest and did not have on-carriage arrangements, which would have been messy to resolve, they just needed 30 bodies. There may have been a requirement to take people from certain parts of the aircraft. The lack of staff at Montréal meant that a friendly and helpful rebooking service was not provided, and I am guessing the word was out that they were disruptive. It's common practice to avoid an argument with offloaded passengers while sat with other passengers, whatever the reason, so the usual protocol is to say "we can discuss this outside the aircraft but the captain has told me that you are not flying, and I don't have any more information right now".
The London ground handlers found a few unattended bags in the cabin in London after disembarkation, in addition to the unclaimed bags, which caused a security event at the London end for which the Metropolitan Police were called.
Last edited by corporate-wage-slave; Jun 23, 22 at 3:22 am
Jun 23, 22, 2:01 am
#70
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Originally Posted by corporate-wage-slave
The version I've heard from a UK member of staff for Menzies, the ground handling agent, is that it was indeed weight / balance issue when the ground handlers in Montréal were unable / unwilling to offload cargo or baggage immediately. Given the ticking clock, the captain had to remove a certain weight quickly, and passengers were selected instead of baggage. Somehow this got communicated to ground staff as passengers were disruptive as opposed to disrupted (language issue?) and the police were called to assist. It wouldn't surprise me if the police and ground staff weren't fully informed either, that seems to be the over-riding issue here, very poor communications, and the ground staff at YUL filled in the gaps with the usual reason people are offloaded without notice. Plus the rather awkward issue about baggage handling. I guess I should point out that this is inevitably a third hand account, so I'm not 100% sure about this.
It kind of stands to reason, in that while you may get one or two people with mask issues who get into a wrangle with cabin crew, you may get at a pinch a problem with a larger group of travellers (see Lufthansa's recent mega cianger), realistically you are not going to get 10 - 20 different and unrelated travellers or groups of travellers all in trouble within a relatively short period with the limited number of crew on this aircraft. What is more likely is that all the passengers did not have status on the manifest and did not have on-carriage arrangements, which would have been messy to resolve, they just needed 30 bodies. There may have been a requirement to take people from certain parts of the aircraft. The lack of staff at Montréal meant that a friendly and helpful rebooking service was not provided, and I am guessing the word was out that they were disruptive. It's common practice to avoid an argument with offloaded passengers while sat with other passengers, whatever the reason, so the usual protocol is to say "we can discuss this outside the aircraft but the captain has told me that you are not flying, and I don't have any more information right now".
The London ground handlers found a few unattended bags in the cabin in London after disembarkation, in addition to the unclaimed bags, which caused a security event at the London end for which the Metropolitan Police were called.
It kind of stands to reason, in that while you may get one or two people with mask issues who get into a wrangle with cabin crew, you may get at a pinch a problem with a larger group of travellers (see Lufthansa's recent mega cianger), realistically you are not going to get 10 - 20 different and unrelated travellers or groups of travellers all in trouble within a relatively short period with the limited number of crew on this aircraft. What is more likely is that all the passengers did not have status on the manifest and did not have on-carriage arrangements, which would have been messy to resolve, they just needed 30 bodies. There may have been a requirement to take people from certain parts of the aircraft. The lack of staff at Montréal meant that a friendly and helpful rebooking service was not provided, and I am guessing the word was out that they were disruptive. It's common practice to avoid an argument with offloaded passengers while sat with other passengers, whatever the reason, so the usual protocol is to say "we can discuss this outside the aircraft but the captain has told me that you are not flying, and I don't have any more information right now".
The London ground handlers found a few unattended bags in the cabin in London after disembarkation, in addition to the unclaimed bags, which caused a security event at the London end for which the Metropolitan Police were called.
Jun 23, 22, 2:55 am
#71
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Originally Posted by corporate-wage-slave
The version I've heard from a UK member of staff for Menzies, the ground handling agent, is that it was indeed weight / balance issue when the ground handlers in Montréal were unable / unwilling to offload cargo or baggage immediately. Given the ticking clock, the captain had to remove a certain weight quickly, and passengers were selected instead of baggage. Somehow this got communicated to ground staff as passengers were disruptive as opposed to disrupted (language issue?) and the police were called to assist. It wouldn't surprise me if the police and ground staff weren't fully informed either, that seems to be the over-riding issue here, very poor communications, and the ground staff at YUL filled in the gaps with the usual reason people are offloaded without notice. Plus the rather awkward issue about baggage handling. I guess I should point out that this is inevitably a third hand account, so I'm not 100% sure about this.
It kind of stands to reason, in that while you may get one or two people with mask issues who get into a wrangle with cabin crew, you may get at a pinch a problem with a larger group of travellers (see Lufthansa's recent mega cianger), realistically you are not going to get 10 - 20 different and unrelated travellers or groups of travellers all in trouble within a relatively short period with the limited number of crew on this aircraft. What is more likely is that all the passengers did not have status on the manifest and did not have on-carriage arrangements, which would have been messy to resolve, they just needed 30 bodies. There may have been a requirement to take people from certain parts of the aircraft. The lack of staff at Montréal meant that a friendly and helpful rebooking service was not provided, and I am guessing the word was out that they were disruptive. It's common practice to avoid an argument with offloaded passengers while sat with other passengers, whatever the reason, so the usual protocol is to say "we can discuss this outside the aircraft but the captain has told me that you are not flying, and I don't have any more information right now".
The London ground handlers found a few unattended bags in the cabin in London after disembarkation, in addition to the unclaimed bags, which caused a security event at the London end for which the Metropolitan Police were called.
It kind of stands to reason, in that while you may get one or two people with mask issues who get into a wrangle with cabin crew, you may get at a pinch a problem with a larger group of travellers (see Lufthansa's recent mega cianger), realistically you are not going to get 10 - 20 different and unrelated travellers or groups of travellers all in trouble within a relatively short period with the limited number of crew on this aircraft. What is more likely is that all the passengers did not have status on the manifest and did not have on-carriage arrangements, which would have been messy to resolve, they just needed 30 bodies. There may have been a requirement to take people from certain parts of the aircraft. The lack of staff at Montréal meant that a friendly and helpful rebooking service was not provided, and I am guessing the word was out that they were disruptive. It's common practice to avoid an argument with offloaded passengers while sat with other passengers, whatever the reason, so the usual protocol is to say "we can discuss this outside the aircraft but the captain has told me that you are not flying, and I don't have any more information right now".
The London ground handlers found a few unattended bags in the cabin in London after disembarkation, in addition to the unclaimed bags, which caused a security event at the London end for which the Metropolitan Police were called.
- Is it normal for such a large plane (77W?) to have weight and balance issues?
- Why would such issues only be discovered after everyone has been boarded?
- How does offloading passengers but leaving their bags resolve those issues?
Jun 23, 22, 3:13 am
#72
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Originally Posted by capedreamer
- Is it normal for such a large plane (77W?) to have weight and balance issues?
- Why would such issues only be discovered after everyone has been boarded?
- How does offloading passengers but leaving their bags resolve those issues?
Jun 23, 22, 3:24 am
#73
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Originally Posted by corporate-wage-slave
I can answer the last two. W+B calculations are done at the last moment and are weather dependent (among other things). It's even been the case that aircraft have trundled back to the departure gate after a late W+B calc requires something to change just prior to departure. The last question: it gets 2 tonnes off the aircraft, and that may be the W+B requirement. 83 kgs for men, 75 kgs for ladies, and I'm glad they aren't more precise than that.
Jun 23, 22, 3:59 am
#74
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Originally Posted by corporate-wage-slave
It kind of stands to reason, in that while you may get one or two people with mask issues who get into a wrangle with cabin crew, you may get at a pinch a problem with a larger group of travellers (see Lufthansa's recent mega clanger).
Jun 23, 22, 4:11 am
#75
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Originally Posted by GodAtum
Off-topic but what was Lufthansa's incident?
