Has anyone experienced police meeting a flight after disruptive passengers?

[Policeontheplane]

Has anyone experienced police on a plane?

Yesterday our flight was eventful. Some drunk people moved themselves to the empty seats in front of me and produced to drink a litre of vodka which they then dropped in front of staff. The staff removed their passports, cue their bad language getting worse. It was all made worse by the drunk man behind me deciding to egg them on. At some point of the guys in front of me apparently threatened another passenger. Air steward told pliot who presumably contacted police. As we were landing the drunk guys in front of us had a big falling out and one got out of his seat, took his suitcase out of the overhead locker and ended up swapping seat.

When we landed everyone was told to return to seats and the air steward told the man who had threatened a passenger to get his bags and escorted him off first - not sure what hapened. I suspect police were waiting for him. Other drunk passengers were just allowed to leave.

Has anyone had experience of this? Will any of them be barred from flying on the airline.

Ugh sounds like a nightmare. I’ll never understand why alcohol is sold in airports.

is this an “asking for a friend” scenario?

I am an aviation lawyer.

Yes, sadly this happens a lot. They can be prosecuted for criminal offences.

Yes they may well be barred. Unruly passenger behaviour is a growing issue and is being tackled at industry level.

https://www.iata.org/en/programs/passenger/unruly-passengers/

Definitely not! My husband had half of larger before then flight and then switched to tea and I don’t drink alcohol at all since menopause.

I was wondering if the same people will be on our return flight and I wondering how common it is as I’ve never since this before never mind been sandwich between drunk people.

Yup, travelling long haul with 2 small kids. 4 of us in middle row of 747, chap across aisle from me got drunker and drunker, kept standing up and taking alcohol out of overhead locker when crew wouldn’t give him more. Big chap so his arse was in my face every time he got up. Before we landed, aircrew gave my husband who was on the other end of the row of 4 a note to pass to me to say not to move when we landed as police would be coming onboard. Everyone told to stay seated when we landed and police came straight on and escorted drunk off plane. It certainly seems to be taken seriously, but I don’t know the long term outcome.

Not directly to the degree that passengers are escorted off the plane, but there has been a few incidences where the cabin crew have got into very strict 'managerial' mode with specific passengers called out eg 'will the man in the grey top in seat 20C sit down NOW or else the police will be called to escort you off the plane' to someone was standing up when the plane was taxiing at the end of a flight where he was persistently rowdy and had already been told off for talking during the safety demo.

This was to somewhere where a lot of people go to party, ie Ibiza, Mallorca or Alicante for Benidorm. These flights can be particularly horrific to the degree that I've always said they should be put on their own plane to spare the rest of us who go there for naice, authentic and calm city breaks

I've also been on a Ryanair flight to Ibiza where everyone was told to put all their alcohol in the overhead locker instead of the normal instruction to keep them on the floor due to the risk of glass bottles breaking and that the lockers could not be accessed during the flight.

But it is something that airlines are taking seriously and you often see stories like this:

Jet2.com comment on jailing of disruptive passenger

I think a lifetime ban is common for serious offenders and some airlines have sought to recover the substantial costs caused if they have to divert

10 Months Jail & $12k Fine: Ryanair Celebrates Conviction Of Unruly Ibiza Flight Duo

Because it makes them a lot of money (it is often said that the air travel is provided as an incentive to get people to spend money in the shops and bars while waiting for flights) and 99% of people can have a drink before and during a flight without causing any bother.

once on a flight from Croatia, un July group sat near by, flight crew confiscated the drinks they had brought on board, they where so unruly that crew moved passengers from around them me included. they tried to separate them to no avail. On landing at Gatwick police attended and arrested the whole group and carted them off the plane in handcuffs.

Monarch flight shortly before they went bust!

The drunk people were all in 40s and 50s and travelling with teenage kids so not Club 18 to 30 people, but yes they were going to the party town of the island.

Luckily, no.

Although we tend to fly to "boring" non party places that don't appeal to the type of person that drinks all their duty free on a flight.

Maybe the answer is to remove everyone's duty free when they board the plane and return it to them when they reach their destination, and to not allow anyone obviously drunk on to the plane in the first place?

Similar to a PP never had the police but was on a very rowdy flight to Germany with two stag dos on it. The pilot came on the speaker and basically said they would divert and land in France somewhere and they would all be arrested and potentially fined thousands each if they didn’t all calm down.

Just travelled back yesterday and noticed Jet2 had a huge poster detailing about not being allowed to fly if you were too drunk or being arrested if you caused trouble on the plane.

I don’t understand why anyone would want to get that drunk on a flight anyway. One drink sure fine.

We have just returned from a Balearic Island and missed a ruckus in the airport when arriving luckily. An older couple and middle aged man got on our transfer bus and I overheard them saying “I can’t believe that. It’s so embarrassing to be British when you’ve got people like that. They should be arrested. Those poor staff.” Etc. It was 10am. It is bloody embarrassing. I really feel for the other passengers and most importantly, the staff.

Haven't experienced it personally but I think the destination country and airline make a big difference to the outcome.

E.g Jet2 will ban for life.

Sadly the drunk dickheads are getting wise to that and decant duty free vodka into water bottles before flying 🙄.

we tend to fly to "boring" non party places that don't appeal to the type of person that drinks all their duty free on a flight.

This is the secret - fly from Heathrow on non-budget airlines to non-AI destinations. The only time I have ever experienced drunk, rowdy passengers was on a delayed Jet2 flight to Alicante (ie Benidorm). Luckily the air crew soon put him back in his box.

I don't understand how people can get steaming on a flight from the UK to Balearics. It's two hours. Also I quite like a glass of wine on a long haul flight and I don't see why the 90% of passengers who can quietly enjoy an Aperol Spritz on the way to their holiday should be punished because of twats.

I don’t get why they search you (Luton airport took a particular dislike of my cargo jeans) and then make you go through a room of booze and perfume in glass bottles! Clearly profit over safety!

We’re not close to London and it was a 4 1/2 hour flight and I guess a litre of vodka would be more than enough to get them drunk. I’m guessing it would put me hospital.

Think this is a growing problem, especially amongst british travellers (would love to be reassured that it happens everywhere). It’s why airline bosses are calling for alcohol sales to be banned at airports and some no longer sell it on flights.

Whilst I love the idea of a pre-flight drink [and big duty free shop on cosmetics] to celebrate the start of a holiday, there really is no reason not to defer that until you arrive at your hotel and have that welcome drink as you check in.

As usual, the minority ruin it for the rest of us but I’d happily forgo a drink if it means families can travel without fear of drunks ruining the experience for their children.

Neither are we. We fly from Manchester or Leeds Bradford, usually with Jet2.

Maybe the answer is to put some kind of security tag on the bottles to prevent them being opened during the flight or decanted into water bottles, then they can be removed at the destination airport.

Only once. A couple got on, she was already well on the way and he’d clearly had a drink. Similar to others have said as they had their own booze and proceeded to get more and more drunk. She then screamed at him for something, he shouted back…they both carried on and you can imagine how that went. Luckily they were a few rows back from me.

Yes! In Frankfurt a few times for different reasons. And rather hilariously one time the gate was held up for an hour and it turns out the perpetrators had disembarked the plane that had been at the gate and left the airport (Schengen so easy). Quite embarrassing I thought.

Has been suggested by some campaigners that a system where you can buy your duty free, but have to leave it at the airport and collect it on your return to gift/drink at home.

This would work for me, as I tend to buy the drink as gifts for others and the hassle of lugging it through the airport in hand-luggage and then having to pack it in cases on my return is such a pain.

Not police no, but we were once met on the tarmac by an ambulance after someone had a heart attack mid-flight.

I remember my parents telling me of a loud, rowdy family on one of their flights to Orlando once. I don't think they were drunk, but pretty cocky and not supervising their kids who were running feral.

They then tried to smoke in the toilets and of course set the alarm off.

The police did not board the plane but when they got off the police were waiting for them and were having a word.

They didn't seem the sharpest tools in the box... one of them kept telling my mum that they were going to hire a car at some point during their holiday in Orlando so they could do a day trip to Graceland...

Because the vast majority of people can control themselves.