Tag Archives: seat

At this rate, the airline industry may soon be less popular than Congress. We're barely even kidding. By now, most of the free world is aware that United Airlines dragged a customer named David Dao often a flight earlier this month because he refused to give up the seat he had paid for. This incident was followed by Delta Airlines tossing a man off a plane because he dared to use the bathroom while the jet was still on the ground. Now, seemingly in an attempt to top its own ridiculousness, Delta has done the following… On April 23, Brian and Brittany Shear say they were on board a flight from Hawaii to California along with their two-year old son. Brian explained to a flight attendant that he originally bought the seat next to him for his 18-year-old son… but decided to put him on an earlier flight so that he could use that same seat for his younger child, Grayson, who was in a car seat. However, the airline said it had overbooked the flight and it needed the seat Mason was now occupying; it argued that it had a right to it because Mason’s name was NOT the name on the ticket that was purchased. It's a bit complicated. But the bottom line is that an airline once again overbooked a flight and, in this case, was telling the parents of a young child that they had to get off as a result. “You’re saying you’re gonna give that away to someone else when I paid for that seat?” Brian tells the airline employee in the video below. “That’s not right.” An airplane employee then says that under Federal Aviation Administration regulations, two-year-old kids cannot have their own seat and must fly while seated in their parents’ laps for the flight. (This is not accurate; the websites for both the FAA and Delta encourage parents to buy separate seats for young children and use a child safety restraint system.) Fine, then: Brian agreed to hold Grayson in his lap. /But he was still told to exit the plane – or face the consequences. According to Brian, an employee said the following to them during this exchange: “You have to give up the seat or you’re going to jail, your wife is going to jail and they’ll take your kids from you.” What a lovely policy. Watch the full encounter below:

Read more:
Delta to Parents: Get Off This Flight… or We’ll Take Your Kids!