Yes, it's off. I use the term myself when I see someone moving or doing something quickly. "Are you on speed?" The usual reply is a big laugh.

It's a figure of speech.

The issue is not whether the term "on speed" is an OK colloquialism.

The issue is that even after the harmless and benign context of the remark was established, the flight crew jointly pursued a vengeful, vindictive and irrational course of action -- presumably to obscure the fact that one of their people actually jeopardized flight safety with a deliberately unintelligible safety briefing.

I believe five to ten percent of flight attendants are certifiably sociopathic or at least irrational, and I no longer initiate any contact with them until I have observed them at length.

This is why:

Last fall I got hung up at BTV on an unplanned overnight due to a Comair mechanical. We were vouchered over to a Hampton Inn and I spent a couple of hours in the bar, sitting next to four or five people that were obviously a flight crew. We nodded hello. They stopped drinking around 800pm.

We had a 600a departure the following morning and when I boarded the RJ I saw our FA was one of the people I'd seen the prior evening. I said something completely unprovocative along the lines of: "Hey, good morning! Nice to see you. Kind of a short turnaround after last night, huh?"

She did not respond and turned away. I settled into 2D. Five minutes later she came and tapped my shoulder roughly: "The captain would like to see you in the jetway."

So I went out there. The captain appeared a minute later and began a long speech: yes, we were in a place that served alcoholic beverages last night, but we stopped drinking before the FAA-mandated cutoff time, we are in no way impaired, any remark that you make implying our impairment is very serious, etc...

He kept a perfectly reasonable tone, as did I... but it dawned on me that the FA had asked him to take me off the aircraft and he thought she was overreacting. So I said I was implying nothing at all, just trying to be friendly, and we shook hands. He went back to the flight deck, I went back to 2D, and when the FA saw me sit down again she went white with anger... visited the flight deck... then slammed the front door shut and we took off.

I didn't get any inflight service (and sure didn't ask for any from this lunatic).

The moral of the story: never volunteer any remark to a flight attendant short of "good morning" unless you already know them. Never create an opening an irrational FA can use to work out a power trip on you. Some of them (not many;just some) will do anything to kick an innocent passenger around; their colleagues will always support them; and the customer never holds the high card in these exchanges.

Our country is insane and our airline industry has more than its share of maniacs. Keep your head down and keep silent until landing.

Then get a lawyer -- which is what the OP should do.

Nope. Not possible since I never started beating my wife.

See? That was easy.

I have also used this term to describe someone who is moving/talking very fast. It was a term we used a lot in the 70's. We might say, is he/she on speed, look how fast they are going/talking? Whether it is proper or not it was a common term. I totally understand why the man was so shocked when the FA made a big deal. Some FA's just need to try to pull a power trip because they are having a bad day/life.

Nothing in the OP's description comes even close to accusing a crew member of being on drugs. If I read the description carefully, the OP was discussing the FA's behavior with another customer - nothing in that discussion was any of the crew's business, nor did the customer have to explain their private remarks to the crew.

If the FA wants to take the position of a drug accusation being levied against a crew member, then there needs to be an accusation, right?

Option 1: customer says to other customer "is that flight attendant on speed or something? why is she talking like that?" There is no accusation

Option 2: customer witnessed crew behavior and approaches crew member privately and states "I believe something may be wrong with that crew member - they're acting like they're on drugs". The accusation is obvious

I agree completely. And I've got an outrageous example of my own.

Last fall, on an AA redeye transcon LAX-JFK, my upgrade failed to clear and so I was stuck in an exit row seat. For reasons that escape me now (perhaps mechanical), the 2345 departure was pushed back until roughly 0130. I was tired.

My seat opponent, a pushy, rude person (probably from LA, maybe from NY) apeared exhausted. She complained repeatedly about the delay and then, once the door finally closed, and the FAs came around to quiz us on the exit door qualification, my seat opponent had drifted off to sleep. I assured the FA that I spoke English and was ready, willing and able to operate the door and follow instructions.

My seat opponent, however, was visibly agitated at being awakened by the FA for the silly quiz. She was antagonistic toward the FA and the FA responded in kind.

The FA threatened, in a very condescending tone, to have her reseated if she refused to cooperate with the safety briefing. Finally, the two of them backed down.

As soon as the FA retreated into the galley, my seat opponent begins criticising the FA, mentioning how "incredibly rude" she was, and how she's flown in exit seats nearly every week of her life, etc.

So what happens next? The FA re-appears and interrupts the rants of my seat opponent. That really sets off the woman next to me and both appear to try to engage me in their dust-up. I just sit there and refuse to say a word. The FA repeatedly announces that she doesn't think my seat opponent is cooperative and that she's either gonna be re-seated or removed. Finally, the seat opponent realizes how much it's gonna suck if she's re-seated and shuts up. Fortunately, the FA finally shuts up and off we go to JFK.

Never in my life have I seen an FA try so hard to pick a fight with a passenger. Granted, the sociopath next to me was a willing accomplice.

"Vengeful, vindictive and irrational" is spot on, IMO.

Nearly every legacy FA is bitter over loss of pay, workrules and benefits. Many are bitter that their management is cashing in now that the industry has recovered somewhat (AA, UA, US, DL, etc). Too many of them seen to long for an incident resembling a security risk (or worse). In website posts, too many of them recite "September 11" as justification for their sociopathic behevior.

Sometimes I wish the legacies had demanded extracted much deeper pay concessions from the FAs. Deep enough that half or two thirds (or even all) of the veterans would have resigned by now and been replaced with fresh-faced "want to see the world despite the slave wages" types.

Lots of issues in play --

It's clear you were punished because of the requirement to go back to the gate and have the entire crew undergo the golden flow. You were punished for their inconvenience. You don't know what the lead flight attendant said to the pilot, but you can be sure it had "interfering with a flight crew in it." Guess what -- the airline industry brought this on themselves because there have been pilots under the influence that have been ratted out by passengers! Who knows? The FA could very well have been on something -- legal or illegal!

The FA clearly put the passengers at a higher risk by not clearly performing the safety briefing. That alone is grounds for some sort of disciplinary action.

It seems, in this post-9/11 world, that passengers have all sorts of liability immunities for ratting out other passengers they feel nervous about (witness the Imans) but have no immunity for the same thing about a member of the flight crew.

1-800-SUE-THEM

I don't see where the OP said the crew had to take a drug test, which is a major part of the issue here. If you point out in good faith that a member of the crew may be under the influence, why should the member get off without further due diligence but you are subjected to further investigation?

Just the opposite of the six Imams case at MSP where the Imams were pulled off the plane but the accusers were free to fly.

What if they were on drugs and this was a part of a ploy to try to keep the OP and pal from making such assertions?

What if you really suspect a FA is impaired? Is that a false asccusation if they come back clean? Erratic behavior could be symptomatic of something else.

US Air. That says it all.

Just incredible.

That's a very important point. If they were concerned they should've ordered drug tests. People should be able to make an observation about this in good faith. That is what the rule is about, purportedly.

Wasn't there a passenger a few years back who, upon boarding, jokingly asked the pilots something like "Hope you're not drunk?!," which caused an immediate flight cancellation, alcohol test for the pilots and some trouble for the passenger? My memory is fading but I think it may have been HP, and it happened not long after some pilots had been arrested for FUI (flying while intoxicated).

Personally, I believe this type of antic is looked upon by some jaded and bitter crew members of all rank and positions as a cheap and easy way to rack up the overtime and get back at the passengers (all of them) who are no longer a valuable resource and the "reason we're here", but a pain in the butt and a general inconvenience to their chosen profession, if you get my drift.

Seriously, I can't help but wonder if there aren't crewmembers who think something like "Oh, yeah, I just hope today that one of these creep pax on board makes some sort of innocuous remark that I can parlay into some lucrative over-time at no real inconvenience or detriment to myself or fellow crewmembers, and use as a notch on my personal resume that I'm in charge here, and following the book, and ever vigilant", etc., etc.

I don't understand how, under any version of the facts, the OP should have been detained. That is, assume the first passenger said "I wonder if FA is on speed." The OP says "The way he said it, I don't think he was accusing anyone of using speed." Even if the FA disagrees with the "reinterpretation", how does that make the OP an interferer?

Here is another example. Assume the first passenger said "I went to a french restaurant last night and had a great bombe for dessert." The FA hears only ysthe word "bomb" and asks for a repeat. The second person says "he was referring to a French dessert called a bombe - he wasn't talking about the kind that explodes." Is the lesson here that the second person should allow the first person be arrested, even though the second person knew it was the fault of the FA? And is the second person subject to arrest for using the word "bombe" on an airplane?

The issue is that an FA in a vicious frame of mind can absolutely seize on an innocent remark like that to put you through hell, and if you object you are "interfering with the duties of the flight crew." There just isn't anything you can do about it if they're determined to wreck your day. You had better just stay quiet until you get where you're going, then collect ID information.