Second this. There's no way to escape the threat, thus the only means of defense is to incapacitate the attacker.

Completely agree ^^^^

I have seen a 14 y.o. autistic teen go berserk, and his mom, dad and a sibling got hurt. It was my cousin, and it was very scary to watch. He had strength far beyond his size when he was in a rage.

If a baby/toddler has a meltdown, there can be a lot of screaming and crying, and maybe some kicking the seat in front, but it unlikely that others would be hurt.

A full-on teenager? Yeah, I'd be worried if the mom said the teen might start scratching people.

If you have a kid that goes into a meltdown if she doesn't have hot food when she wants it, why the heck wouldn't you routinely travel with a wide-mouth thermos that you can get filled with steaming hot food when you're in the terminal before getting on the plane?

Failing to plan is planning to fail.

Agreed. This Mom is the problem not the teen. I read the Moms Facebook post which was incomprehensible in some parts. I have no sympathy for her at all and if she does take UAL to court them UA should counter sue. She just seems very self righteous and entitled. Maybe she should have stayed home and donated the money she spent on the Disney trip to the poor. then none of this would have happened.

I wholly agree that it's disturbing if bad things happen when one is minding their own business. The best of us might lose our minds.

So consider this young adult's perspective. None of the accounts (even those presumptive or speculative) have suggested that she was doing anything other than minding her own business. It was the non-autistic collection of adults in her vicinity that lost their cool.

Did she threaten anyone?

Did she assault anyone?

Did she lose her mind when escorted from the plane by police?

She did not.

She remained calm and composed and appears, to me, to be one individual involved who distinguished themselves with mature conduct.

So, by all means, let's debate the conduct of the parents, UA and the authorities. But please understand that the individual at the centre experienced a very bad day, not of her making.

She deserves a good deal of respect.

Sometimes bad days become good days in the end.

The girl is what, 15? In a few years, she'll be able to purchase her own ari travel, and she'll look back on this and remember United for the airline that it is. And how Delta saved the day.

And if her parents end up with a settlement to their lawsuit, there might be some cash in it as well.

While it was a bad day on that day, it's possible that she'll remember it down the road as the day that made her a loyal Delta customer, and the day that United paid for her college education. Ultimately, a good day in the end.

Or maybe she'll just figure out that her mom is a jerk, but that she loves her anyway.

:D:D:D

I think her comments about poverty, in light of what she does for a living, make the situation even stranger. Does she think most people will truly relate her experience to people in actual poverty?

She was interviewed on KFI-AM Los Angeles during the 1:30-2:00 pm slot on Tuesday. She sounded like a reasonable person appropriate to her education and profession. I did not hear the whole interview, but it sounded like she was frustrated in the FAs inability to understand the medical situation, and that the price of finally getting the hot food was an inaccurate report given to the captain who made the later decision. She was not looking for money, but training of FAs in understanding the nature of autism.

So if one can think from her perspective: Whatever fault she had for not being prepared (or surprised), she had to, in good conscience with professional knowledge and personal experience, and especially with the manifested IGNORANCE of the FAs, declare a threat. Upon accommodation, she also in the same manner declared that the threat had ended (especially if the flight had proceeded to PDX as scheduled). Then on the ground she had to endure the less-than-completely informed paramedics, LEOs, and cockpit crew.

It is reasonable to me that she wanted FAs trained on autism.

That opens a very large door. I believe FA's should have safety training (ex. CPR) for certain, but to be familiar with autism as well as multiple other conditions? It sounds like she wants all FAs to be registered nurses as well.

On the other hand, maybe this would help to increase turnover of some of the more seasoned FAs we get to "enjoy" these days.

Mom is a jerk, even if daughter doesn't figure it out.

She had been 'howling' before the hot food was supplied. This is extremely different from your description of the situation, and it's clear that the 15 year did not remain calm and composed. Many, if not most, reports of this story have mentioned this behaviour. E.g.

http://gawker.com/united-allegedly-r...-fo-1703774723

Here the parents admit that Juliette had a meltdown on the plane.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/n...tism/27123423/

The husband seems to be honest while the mother is completely in denial and or changing her version of the story to tailor it to her agenda. Whack job mother. That poor husband and family.

The mother is being supported by the media. The media appear to mostly be reporting her side of the story, while giving limited or in some cases no coverage to differing opinions.

Which is how they usually do things, once they decide what agenda they want to push. :mad::(

How is this reasonable?

Who will do the training and how much will it cost? How long will FA's need to be off planes? Autism is a complex condition...should the training just consist of following the orders of parents at any cost?

Are there enough instances where autism causes an in-flight issue that all of the above make the cost of training worthwhile? I bet one diversion and a frivolous lawsuit cost less than the training.

Now, what about all the disabilities, medical conditions, and other disorders passengers could have? Why is it reasonable to train on autism but not everything else?

Why limit to airline employees? What about all bus drivers?

You may think it's reasonable, but it's completely impractical.

It's actually the mother that needs training. She needs to learn that a few quiet and polite words to the crew ahead of the flight will likely create a better outcome than threatening harm to other passengers.

Agree. The Mother doesn't seem to get that the special needs of her "special needs Daughter" are her responsibility. Not mine, not yours, and not United's. I don't get why the press doesn't ask questions, like why the Mother didn't prepare for her daughter's need on the ground. Get hot food to carry on, or arrange for hot food on the plane in advance. You can't drop this stuff on a flight crew after you reach cruising altitude.

I think it reasonable that the captain chose to act on the initial threat. There is no basis for a captain to believe the threat has ended, or that it wouldn't start up again, simply due to the perpetrator revising their statement. Kind of like saying you have a weapon or malicious intent while at a TSA checkpoint but later saying you were joking. The ordeal that will ensue will not be stopped by revoking your initial threat. Seems like Mom thought the threat would stack her hand, but she didn't realize the deck is weighted to favor the house...

The mom has milked her Secial Situation for years, this was prepared,

A normal person limits their liability, unless they want attention for themself..

Do they'd still make thermos jugs...because hot meals at 35,000 feet are limited and delivery service is not good.

She was no MD, A mail order PhD, play it for your newsletter

I'll post the entire "howling" quote from your referenced article:

"There was a lot of howling, and we thought well, what’s going on? And it never stopped,” Hedlund said.

“She wasn’t put off the plane because she had autism, she was put off the plane because she was maybe proposing some kind of a threat, to (about) 170 other people at 36,000 feet, which doesn’t make anyone feel safe,” Hedlund said. “What if she got crazy and got up and opened an exit door at 36,000 feet?”

I'll leave it to the group to assess the credibility of this witness. Others quoted in that same article were less colourful.

The video speaks for itself.

I'll stand by my assessment of the young lady's character. I'll fly with her any day.

Right you are. They like to find a victim de jour whether they are a victim or not.

No one here is questioning her character. We're questioning the character of her mother. The child did nothing wrong as far as I can tell from the articles.

By the way, incessant howling can be unnerving to those who don't know what's happening. But that has nothing to do with a person's character.

Threatening a FA until you get your way is a fine example of someone's character.

You edited out the part of my post where the young woman's father herself admitted that she'd had a 'meltdown'. Also, just because Hedlund expressed concerns about what may have happened which are not realistic does not in any way mean that her descriptions of what did happen should be ignored. Even passengers such as Chris Hall who don't think Juliette was disruptive enough to justify being thrown off the plane admit that she was making noise. Which is very far from your description of Juliette remaining calm and composed at all times.

Yes, by the time of the video, they were quiet and behaving well. But, you claimed that Juliette had been calm the entire time. This clearly is not the case.

I stand by my conclusion that you have dramatically misrepresented her behaviour on the plane.

The story showed up in a couple of places on my Facebook feed yesterday. (Redbook, Refinery 29) It was interesting how the first few posts would be all pro-mom, how dare UA? and then someone would say that they read a few more stories that covered more of the whole picture and the tone would shift to being pro-UA instead once a little bit of the airline POV came out.

Mom is described as a frequent flyer. Shouldn't she have well known the airline's policy on food provided (or not) with ticket and what's available for sale long ago?

The father states in the video that the daughter scratched him during her melt down. The incident escalated. This behavior, in addition to the mother's threat, are likely the determining factors in the decision to make the emergency landing.

You raise a couple of interesting points about crew training. Allow me to break it down a bit.

Most of this incident revolves around the interaction between mom and the crew. Mom is not disabled; she is a merely a difficult person. Properly trained FAs should be able to prevent, stabilize or resolve issues with difficult people. It is something right in their wheelhouse.

If this is not included in their training, it is very reasonable to do so. If it is included in their training, then the training failed here.

As for training on disabilities, deep knowledge of all sorts of disabilities is not required. But airlines do make accomodations for disabilities, whether by law or benevolence. It is reasonable to expect FAs to be trained in how disabilities are to be accomodated, and how they can support the caregivers.

In this case the accomodation requested (rudely or not) was to sell a leftover business class meal. If the request was reasonable, then the accomodation should have been made without fuss.

At law, the definition of reasonable becomes important. Differing duties are placed on public entities and private corporations. IMHO it's tragic if a judge needs to decide this case.

On a humanitarian level, the request wouldn't have put anyone out and would have prevented any escalation of tensions.

Here too, I'll fail UA for their training.

This was very well said. And outside of the dysfunctional fear culture at United Continental Holdings, this is likely what would have happened elsewhere.

If the FA felt empowered to accommodate and that they would be backed up in doing so, the right thing would have been done, and this would not have escalated into an issue at all.

This is, at least, a more reasonable perspective. UA fails at customer service regularly, and it's scores show that. I have no doubt that the FA could have been more polite or sought to better understand the request.

The next question is whether better customer service would have solved the situation. I'm not sure we can answer that, but I will agree it wouldn't have made it worse.

I do think the FA tried at least a little to ease the situation, as a F meal was brought to the child. It's reasonable for the FA's first response to be that F meals weren't available. The next reaction by the mother was to make a threat. If the mother had calmly explained the situation at that point, perhaps the FA may have agreed and the incident would be over.

IMO, the mother escalated the situation, not the FA. Better customer service may have prevented the situation, but it may not have. The mother turned it into a safety issue. As soon as that happened, the FA was obligated to inform the captain. The captain deemed it a safety issue as well, which is a reasonable reason to divert and deplane a passenger.

It's certainly an unfortunate situation, and it probably could have been avoided, but the mother instigated it. If you look at just the facts, UA did nothing wrong. It doesn't mean any of us feel any better about it happening, but poor customer service is not a reason to file a lawsuit.

I just don't believe this is a training issue. Despite all the customer service training in the world, when a human being is faced with a stressful situation (howling child that had already scratched her father, demanding mother, and a threat that the child might attack other passengers), they sometimes just react.

United seems to be lacking in compassion these days. Some retraining or additional training would be good.

Lol this possibly the dumbest thing I've read on here in a long time. Special needs not the sole responsibility of those afflicted with them or caring for them. You are saying in effect that wheelchair ramps are the problem of the person in the wheelchair... What you have said completely flies in the face of the ADA.

I think it is you that doesnt get that accessibility is a societal problem.

Don't remember reading anywhere in the ADA that hot food needs to be made available. There are certain things the ADA does require, like wheelchair access but it says no where that hot food has to be made available. And that is what I got out of the persons statement you rudely called the dumbest thing you ever read. For things beyond the scope of the ADA the caregiver most definitely does need to be prepared and shouldn't expect everyone around them to go beyond the scope of the ADA.

It does not take a village to raise a child. It takes proper parenting. This incident is clearly not a societal issue, as suggested.

The ADA argument is ridiculous since the mother and her lack of parenting skills are the root cause.

Agreed, I don't know how you take a point in time video and assert that was the behavior the entire trip. I also like how certain people totally ignore the father's comment. Some of the axe-grinding in these threads is amazing.

The mother doesn't even have a mail order PhD. It's a Ed.D. which is completely different.

Do we know the name of the hero who gave up that first class meal which bought them time until everyone was safe on the ground?

In some accounts, the Mom states that the family had dinner before the flight but that the daughter was unwilling to eat anything. If Mom decided that daughter should not get on the plane until she had a meal, would United have accommodated them on a later flight from Houston? -- Suzanne

Sure, based on availability. The mother was a platinum, she could do a free same day change.

If she weren't Platinum, it wouldn't have been as easy. But UA re-accomodates for medical and safety issues all the time. If the mother would have calmly explained the issue to an agent, and that there was a possible safety issue, why wouldn't UA work with her? They were willing to re-accommodate the family once in SLC by purchasing them a new ticket on DL.

Although I will caveat this by saying this is where you risk getting some pretty poor customer service from UA, and Houston is one of the locations I've experienced it. So it may not have been easy or fun for the family.

Proactively explaining a medical situation is likely to have a better outcome than making a threat in an airplane 35k feet above the ground.

Wonder if they emailed CS saying they didn't get their meal choice and were offered 3,000 miles.

I didn't say training was reasonable. I said I could see it reasonable that (from her perspectives) she is now legally demanding training as a result of interaction with FAs.

And unfortunately it was made, with fuss.