AIBU to think cancelling the flight over a child was excessive

[MrsShawnHatosy]

An airline cancelled a flight because a child refused to sit down and put their seatbelt on. AIBU to think they should have asked the parents to get off, rather than cancelling the flight and stranding the rest of the passengers?

https://www.mirror.co.uk/travel/news/flight-cancelled-passengers-stranded-due-37532204

I wonder if the parents in question were afraid to publicly restrain/hold down their child, especially as presumably the entire exasperated cabin of people would have been staring at them. Let's face it, it's pretty much inevitable that some passenger would have whipped their phone out and filmed them, giving an out of context explanation of the situation.

His parents would know their child. Or should do.

His reaction is unlikely to have come out of the blue to his parents.
He slid out of his seat ( without parents noticing ) and hid underneath.

Yes, I'm surely the parents put themselves through this ordeal entirely voluntarily, in full knowledge of exactly what was likely to happen

And necessary. People seem to forget just how dangerous planes can be if you do not follow what you are being told ( not asked) to do.

Yes it’s been mentioned a few times if you read the thread

far better to fine the parents and ban the child 😜

I am afraid there will be people who will take a risk. Who will hope.
Who will persuade themselves it will/should be alright.
That the temptation of the flight over another form of travel makes it so.

Not full knowledge of what would happen, no.
But quite possibly a concern something untoward might.

It would be very unusual for a child to suddenly behave in such a way and also be unresponsive to parents or crew.

Someone who was there and had to reschedule:

Flight attendants Kozuch chatted with told him they hadn’t seen anything like the child’s refusal across their decades of experience, he said.

“Kids refuse this all the time, and eventually, they always comply,” Kozuch said. “At least, that’s what they assumed would happen.”

Kozuch said online comments calling the child bratty or admonishing the toddler’s parents for not doing more don’t “empathetically capture the situation,” and he found the aircraft crew to be quite helpful.

Having noticed that too I wonder if this flurry against the parents and the child is driven by the airlines PR...

Rather convenient for them that the whole focus around that flight is not on their comms around delays etc.

Quite. If it was all down to an epidemic of poor parenting, this would happen all the time, and it doesn't.

I think it's more likely driven by inherent unpleasantness and need to feel superior.

My kids were good kids and I never experienced a situation I couldn't manage, but the arrogance of people absolutely convinced they know what happened and it could never possiblly have happened on their watch.

The idea that the situation could have been easily resolved by two adults holding him down and yet no one did. The mind boggles.

Also - to those who say you know your child...

You do, but you also don't.

The essential nature of all children is continuous change, and continuous intellectual development.

Mine were confident sleepers until they gained intellectual insight and imagination - things could exist in the dark...the all hell broke loose!

And, as others have said, the first indication of illness in a child is often whinny and weepy.

I hope both parents and child are ok, and I hope their travel was not urgent.

Main gripe I can really find about the comms (and it's a fair gripe) is that it was bad on the night ...TBH midnight cancellation at an outstation comms are never going to be great these days at most airlines..

Porter seem to have gone to ground and reality is they probably can't say much more due the rights to privacy the family have.

OTOH I've sensed a lot of the early efforts on-line and to some extent in the MSM have been attempts or hints at painting the airline as being unreasonable for cancelling the flight (classic case being the title of this thread and the whole AIBU as an example)

Bottom line here is the flight was cancelled as a result of the child's behaviour.

But of course it's inconvenient for some to admit that.

No excuse for inconveniencing a plane load of passengers and costing the airline thousands.
Yes I realise the plane had left the gate but seatbelts should have been on by then.

No one's saying the plane wasn't cancelled because of the child's behaviour, but even the people on the plane, who do know the circumstances, are treating the family with some empathy.

@Lifelover16

Yes I realise the plane had left the gate but seatbelts should have been on by then

Should, yes, agreed....but you'd be amazed how many adults somehow supposedly forget to actually fasten those belts until picked up on it by the Cabin Crew during their walkround checks...

It's almost as if some people, even adults, are resistant to wearing them.

I think they were. The child was settled and behaving until the plane started moving.

Has any of you stopped to think that the child may have autism or ADHD, their could be lots of reasons for the boys meltdown, maybe he has never been on a plane before, he may have been scared, if he was to have any of these conditions then he will not know how to deal with certain emotions and change of his normal day 2 day routine, or the fact he may just be so so frightened and look
you all are absolutely disgusting with these comments!!!! You should be ashamed of yourselves!!!!!!!!!! ADHD is not a naughty child, do your research!!!!!!! AND MOST OF YOU LOOK EVEN MORE STUPID BECAUSE YOU CANT SPELL!!!! AND YOUR GRAMMAR IS ABSOLUTELY TERRIBLE!!!!! WOW!!!!!

Well my autistic nephew would not have coped well at all if the plane needed to turn around and go back to the gate. He is well prepared and understands plane journeys. If it suddenly didn’t happen he would have been having a massive meltdown that would take hours to recover from. He would likely be hitting himself and otters repeatedly. He probably wouldn’t sleep much that night and neither would the family. So even if the other child is autistic or has ADHD that wouldn’t stop my nephew and his entire family being badly affected. It’s even possible my nephew would then refuse to get on the plane the next day as he would be panicking it wouldn’t take off again. And NO AMOUNT OF SHOUTING AND CALLING PEOPLE STUPID OR DISGUSTING AND USING MULTIPLE EXCLAMATION MARKS WILL CHANGE MY NEPHEWS REACTION AND SUBSEQUENT CONSEQUENCES TO AN INCIDENT LIKE THIS!!!!!!!!!!!!! WOW!!!!!!!

Yep. Except I've been on multiple plane journeys with ADHD and autistic children who I've only known a few hours before becoming their carer. And I can tell you zero of them behaved in a way that led to to an entire plane being cancelled.

Surely your experience with you autistic children means you understand they aren't all the same.

The parents should be responsible for the costs to the airline, plus to all the passengers severely inconvenienced by the overnight delay.

It was edited before you responded.

Yep I saw that had happened but well after I had responded and too late to edit in response to the edit (IYKWIM).

Yes. But I also understand that a) parents know their children and would definitely know if a late night flight was going to be an issue for their (autistic) child and therefore not book it (parenting issues) or b) know how to manage their child and be able to use those techniques to get them to comply (parenting issues).

It's either or but either way it circles back to a parenting issue.

The flight was already 6hours delayed.
So parents didn't book a last night flight.
It was a combination of factors that led to the delay. The child was probably getting wound up for hours by the airport as well.