A passenger on an Allegiant Air flight was removed after he reportedly made “threatening statements to the flight attendant,” the company said.
But new video footage shows the man only asking the attendant to wear a face mask during the flight.
- An employee said: “I need you to come off or I get law enforcement.”
- The passenger said: “I just asked somebody to put on their face mask, that’s all I did.”
- The passenger was then removed from the flight.
- One passenger said: “That’s not right, this is ridiculous.”
Allegiant told The Washington Post in a statement that the “passenger became disruptive during the pre-flight safety briefing … Following the announcement, the passenger persisted in making threatening statements to the flight attendant, to the point of harassment.”
Allegiant told Newsweek that the flight attendant lowered their face covering “for speaking into the PA so the briefing could be understood.”
The Allegiant policy reads:
All customers are required to wear a face covering over their nose and mouth at all times when traveling to help protect them and those around them … Face coverings may be briefly removed to eat or drink, but otherwise must be worn at all times including at the ticket counter and gate, during boarding and while onboard the aircraft.
Multiple airlines have asked passengers to leave flights when they’re not wearing face masks. And these airlines have banned passengers from their flights because they’re not wearing a face covering, as I wrote for Deseret.com.
Airlines shared their numbers with The Los Angeles Times.
- United Airlines — 150.
- Spirit Airlines — 128.
- Frontier Airlines — 106.
- Hawaiian Airlines — 6.
- Alaska Airlines — 78, plus 92 warnings or “yellow cards” to passengers.
- American Airlines and Southwest Airlines did not reveal their numbers.