Seniors
CHEWIN' TOBACCOI had an out-and-back, a one day round-trip flight for a business meeting, that was three hours each way. I had a window seat on a full flight and was pleased when a rural friendly-looking elderly couple sat down next to me; Harold (not his real name) sat next to me and his wife took the aisle seat.
This was their first airplane flight and Harold was nervous. Apparently, when Harold got nervous, he talked incessantly. His mouth was full of chewin' tobacco so when he talked I was inundated with a rain of soggy brown speckles. Since I was not staying overnight I had no change of clothes, and I had put my jacket in the overhead bin, so my white shirt was becoming patterned in a disgusting manner. Harold was very apologetic, but that didn't stop him.
I kept politely asking Harold to face forward when he talked, but his memory was short. His wife kept yelling at him to stop his behavior, and she apologized to me over and over again. But whenever we succeeded in getting Harold to stop, it would only last a few minutes. He would begin by apologizing and talking to me while facing forward, but before long I was getting sprayed again. And when I'd hold a magazine up to block the spittle, he never seemed to take the hint - I had to ask him to stop.
When I got to my destination I had to rush to a men's store and buy a new shirt, trashing the old one. I was late for my meeting but I had a good excuse and a great story to tell. 10/08
MOM LOST AND NEGLECTED IN THE AIRPORT
My mom lives in Southern California and flies from LAX to Dallas/Fort Worth to visit us once or twice a year. She is 82 years old, walks unsteadily with a cane, and easily gets lost in unfamiliar places. Pre-9/11 we would meet her at the gate, but since that is no longer an option, we always arrange to have her met by an attendant with a wheelchair to take her to the baggage claim area where we meet her. We have done this successfully on Southwest and US Airways in the past. On her last trip, we found a good fare on a non-stop flight on American, so we paid a little extra to get her a non-stop flight.
When I booked the flight, I explained her needs and arranged to have her met by a wheelchair and offered to pay any extra fees that they might charge for an attendant to assist her. I was assured that everything was arranged, there were no extra charges, and there would be no problem. When my brother put her on the flight in LA, he reconfirmed with the gate agent that she needed to be met and was told it was taken care of.
Three hours later, I’m sitting at DFW with my family waiting for my mother. The flight arrives; no Mom. Luggage from her flight is on the carousel being picked up by passengers; no Mom. I see a couple of people being brought in with wheelchairs and ask the attendants about her. They claim to know nothing, saying that someone else must be bringing her down. They leave. All of the luggage and the passengers are gone; still no Mom. We are becoming seriously concerned.
My husband begins making inquiries and gets very little help. He is informed that no one is in the gate area, so she must have left. The clerk at the check-in desk claims that there are no records indicating that she needed any type of assistance. I am beginning to panic. My husband, who, fortunately, is not the type to panic or go quietly, starts making enough of a fuss that security gets involved. They claim to check the terminal, but find no one matching her description. My husband asks to be let in to look for her. They refuse, citing security concerns. He pulls out his ID, including his work badge from a very well known company, and even offers to allow security to run his fingerprints if they can do a live scan, whatever it takes to allow him to go look for her. He asks if someone from security can escort him. Finally he gets loud enough that someone higher-up authorized him to go in, unescorted, to look for her. It has now been an hour and a half since her flight arrived at the gate. Ten minutes later, he finds her, in tears, wandering around the terminal totally lost.
It seems that the wheelchair attendants had two other people requiring assistance. They took them, and told her to wait there and they would be right back. They never came back for her. These are undoubtedly the same two attendants I saw in the baggage claim area and asked about her. She sat at the gate for over an hour, in tears and absolutely no one offered to help. During this time, security claimed to have checked the gate area and found no one. She told us that she tried to get some help, but every worker she asked just answered her kind of vaguely, pointed off in the distance, and hurried on their way. She was completely lost, nearing hysterics, and said that the only thing that kept her from a complete breakdown was that she knew we wouldn’t leave until we found her. I strongly suggested that next time, she go ahead and have a loud, screaming, hysterical, breakdown and maybe someone will notice her.
By the way, her flight arrived at 6 PM on a Saturday night and the terminal was virtually empty. She was an elderly woman, wearing a bright red sweater with a cat embroidered on the front, hobbling along with a cane, crying. If security couldn’t spot her in the terminal, I wonder how we can expect them to spot terrorists. 12/07
WIFEY PUNCHED BY ELDERLY "SLEEPWALKER"
Wifey and I were on a trip to the Philippines and taking our toddlers, one of 10 months, the older just under 2. Due to airline regs, we could not sit next to each other, and I ended up in the row behind wifey. We were flying on Philippine Air Lines, (PAL) which a Filipino will tell you, stands for Plane Always Late. We had a fuel stop in Hawaii that was only supposed to be an hour, but turned into two, because they decided to remove a drunk. Wifey and I were exhausted from constantly attending to our kids, and lack of sleep, and were anxiously anticipating takeoff on this final leg. I was holding our sleeping 10 month old, when I saw a sudden movement in front of me next to wifey that caught my eye. The passenger next to her, a somewhat elderly man who seemingly startled awake, turned towards wifey and with a maniacal expression on his face put his left hand behind her head and punched her in the mouth with his fist! I jumped up with my sleeping baby in my arms and shouted, "What the fudge do you think you're doing!?" Only I didn't say fudge! I got some whispered reply, then yelled, "Keep your fudging hands off my wife!" At this point my focus changed and I noticed we were surrounded by staring passengers. A couple of flight attendants came running and gave wifey some ice for her bloody lip. I wanted us moved, but they moved the puncher instead to the drunks empty seat. I was the only one who saw what happened. The puncher claimed he had been "sleepwalking" and given he was a small, harmless old man, I had to believe him. He apologized repeatedly. But, as I had been the only witness, without wifey's bloody lip, we probably would not have been believed. If I had not been sitting behind him, out of reach and holding our sleeping baby, I probably would have physically attacked him as I was in a rage. And we would have been kicked off the plane instead and still be in Hawaii. And you know, my baby never woke up! 10/07
OLD LADY CAN'T GET NO SATISFACTION
I was flying from St. Louis to Denver on a humid summer day. The aircraft was hot and stuffy as we pushed back from the gate and taxied toward the runway. As we waited our turn to take off, the elderly lady in the seat in front of me began to complain loudly about the heat. When the flight attendant walked by to make a final safety check, the elderly lady flagged her down. "How much longer must we wait? I can't breathe!" The flight attendent took her remark literally, and decided it was a medical emergency. She ran to notify the captain, who turned the aircraft around and headed back to the gate. Just as quickly, she returned with an oxygen bottle and mask, which she insisted on applying to the lady over her protests. The fun was just beginning. The man across the aisle interrupted the flight attendant. "Excuse me, Miss, but the bag is not inflating and I don't believe the oxygen is flowing properly." "Are you a doctor?", asked the attendant. "Yes, I am." (Omygosh, thinks the attendant. An authority figure!) Meanwhile, the elderly passenger is trying to push the mask off and keeps asking how soon we can take off. When we returned to the gate, the attendant opened the door to two paramedics, two police officers, and a passenger service manager. They all rushed toward the scene of the "emergency." The lady tried to tell the paramedics there was nothing wrong with her, but they insisted on checking her vital signs. All seemed to be well. She declined medical attention and the paramedics reluctantly departed. Then it was the pasenger service manager's turn. He told the lady the airline cannot risk a medical emergency in flight and said she must get off the aircraft. The lady flatly refused to move, and told the manager she must keep a doctor's appointment in Denver later that day. The manager retreated to the front of the aircraft, to consult with corporate headquarters by phone. The two police officers hovered closer to her seat as we wondered if they are going to mace, club, and cuff the lady, who is old enough to be their grandmother. Finally, the manager returned with the good news that the airline would permit her to remain aboard. The manager and the police departed, but we still couldn't leave the gate until they replaced the faulty oxygen bottle. We waited even longer in the heat, until the replacement bottle arrived and we pushed back from the gate for a second time. As soon as we were airborne the crew turned on the air conditioning. When the seat belt light went off, the lady summoned the attendant to tell her, "It's so cold in here! I'm FREEZING! Can't you do something?" At that point, I think the rest of us wanted to line up and smack her, like that scene from the movie, "Airplane." Oh, and a final word about the "doctor." Well, somewhere over Kansas we found out he was a veterinarian! 10/07 BAH!
NO REST FOR THE WEARY
I was recently on a red eye flight across the U.S. - after a 2 hour delay we were finally airborne. I proceeded to recline my seat when the elderly man behind me starting throwing a child-like temper tantrum, hitting and kicking my seat complaining that he had no room. I decided to be the bigger person and put my seat upright which did nothing to aliviate the kicking of my seat. Every time I would almost fall asleep (sitting straight up) he would kick or hit my seat. In addition, there was a small child seated next to me who slept with her feet on my lap while her mother slept comfortably in the aisle seat. I requested to move but the only other seats available were middle seats and I didn't want to punish those lucky passengers with an open middle seat. I arrived at my destination completely exhausted after getting zero sleep overnight. 10/07
NURSING HOME IN THE SKY
In the high-flying, heady days of the Internet, I was working at a firm in Boston, MA and was attending a conference in San Jose, CA. I was flying back to Boston on a flight with one stop in Denver. The flight to Denver was uneventful, but there we picked up a large group of elderly passengers who were traveling with caregivers. Getting these folks settled was difficult, and some of them were in the early stages of dementia, as they clearly didn't know why they were on a plane. After MANY demands from the flight crew to sit down and buckle their seat belts, we finally were able to take off. This leg of the flight was a nightmare. I was seated mid-cabin, near the center lavatories. As soon as the Fasten Seat Belts light was off, the migration of the elderly to the restrooms began. Some people used walkers, some canes, some refuse to be assisted to the restroom, only to call the Flight Attendant to help them clean themselves. The most difficult cases wore adult diapers that needed to be changed, and the caregivers needed to help them. This meant that the door to the lavatory had to remain open. Several people fell either on their way to the lavatory or back to their seat. Throughout the flight, I could hear many of them moaning, groaning, burping, slurping, etc. Finally, we approached Boston's Logan airport. Again, the flight crew had to work hard to get these passengers in their seats and prepared for landing. The nervous twitters of pre-landing died down and I breathed a sigh of relief that I would soon be off the plane. Looking out of the window, I could see the tops of houses. Then the Call Flight Attendant button was pushed behind me. A Flight Attendant came over the intercom and explained that we would be landing shortly. The button was pushed again. And again. And again. An agitated flight attendant came from behind me and began speaking with a woman. The woman explained that her husband had to use the restroom. NOW. The attendant explained that he couldn't get up from his seat. I looked down to see the tops of the houses and I could almost read the license plates of the cars parked in the driveways. And then the man let go. Not number one. And he wasn't wearing a diaper. The stench was unbearable. People began to vomit - loudly. The man in the soiled pants began to cry, the woman with him began to sob. We landed. Then we taxied. Then we stopped. The Flight Attendants were on the intercom begging for calm and for people to remain in their seats. Those of us closest to the scene ignored them and moved to the front of the plane. We were trapped on the plane for nearly 20 minutes waiting for a gate before we finally got off the plane. I, and others, went to the gate agent to complain to the airline. We were basically told to choose another airline if we were disappointed with the service. I never found out why those people were flying to Boston, but it must have been as bad a flight for them as it was for us. 10/07 Signed, No Flight of Fancy
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