Three women, apparently of Indian descent, were removed from a Spirit Airlines flight in the United States after a heated argument with a flight attendant. A video of the confrontation, posted on TikTok, has garnered over 4 million views in just a few days.
The incident caused the flight to be delayed by over an hour until police arrived and escorted the women off the plane.
HT.com has reached out to Spirit Airlines for a statement. This copy will be updated on receiving a response.
What happened on the Spirit Airlines flight?
A TikTok user, @khamisidrismoh, shared a video that shows the three women seated in a row while a flight attendant stands in the aisle during a disagreement. The women appear to be upset and accuse the crew member of not knowing the flight’s destination.
“You don’t know where the flight is going. First of all, you don’t know…” one of the women is heard saying, after the attendant mistakenly claimed the flight was headed to New Orleans instead of New York.
The flight attendant acknowledges her mistake, saying she misspoke when she said New Orleans. “I’m sorry about that. That is my mistake,” she says. The attendant then appears to request the women to stow their baggage underneath the seat in front of them.
{{/usCountry}}The flight attendant acknowledges her mistake, saying she misspoke when she said New Orleans. “I’m sorry about that. That is my mistake,” she says. The attendant then appears to request the women to stow their baggage underneath the seat in front of them.
{{/usCountry}}The women appear not to have heard her – or willfully ignore her – before bringing up her New Orleans mix-up again.
“You told so many times that is New Orleans. So first of all you have to know where we are going,” one woman argued.
At this point, the flight attendant seems to lose her patience and warns the women they will be deplaned. “Okay, you know, just for that, I’m going to make sure you guys get off. This is easy for me. Watch,” says the Spirit Airlines flight attendant before stalking away.
Escorted off the flight by cops
The second part of the video, uploaded on TikTok, shows cops entering the plane to deboard the passengers.
“After the previous video I posted, we were delayed for an hour. Ultimately the cops had to show up and threaten to use physical force to remove them,” TikTok user @khamisidrismoh wrote.
“Stand up and walk with us. We can talk more out there. But right now, stand up and walk with us,” one police officer was heard telling the women.
The women still refused to get off and had to be threatened with jail time. They were heard arguing with the three cops that came on the flight to escort them away. “I’m telling you what’s happening. Either you are gonna get off the plane, or you’re going to jail,” the officer said.
The women eventually managed to gather their luggage and deboarded, allowing the flight to take off after a delay of over an hour.
The videos have led to much criticism of their behaviour on social media, with many accusing the three Indian women of talking rudely to the flight attendant.