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

Could you please explain to me ind email why this comment is funny?

The article quoted passengers saying the child was terrified rather than being 'bratty'. They were also small enough they could slip their seat belt. Over the age of 2 a child must be in their own seat - but seat belts on planes are not really designed for under 5s.

Planes for not have these usually. It is super annoying!

lol come on, it’s not “vile” to be livid that your flight was cancelled because of other people, no matter what the issue. It’s a massive inconvenience. You can’t expect people to just happily smile through it.

I’ve reported that comment but it’s still there.

Why is it vile to be livid a flight was cancelled whatever the reason? I was pissed off once that i needed to leave the cinema at 9.30pm on a Saturday night because someone brought a baby that wouldn’t stop screaming. It’s never happened before. Adults have caused me far more issues in the cinema over the years. I was still pissed off because I couldn’t hear the film and I wasted money and time going there for no reason. I’m certainly not “vile” because of that.

If you want 5 point harnesses at every seat it would mean a complete redesign of the seats and floor attachments, probably meaning costs up.....and people want cheap travel.

The existing seat belts have shown their worth in many previous incidents and accidents.

There are harnesses available for small children (not sure what Porter's rules are on use) but the parents are expected to provide them...the airline's aren't going to start buying them and shipping them around on a just in case basis - why? Because people want cheap travel.

I was on a Ryanair flight when this happened. We were already on the runway accelerating for take off when the child stood on his seat. A member of cabin crew screamed "Strap in that FUCKING child!" Parents and child were so shocked it worked.

It’s not funny, how and why have you assumed that ?

For what reason?

They’ve used eye rolling not laughing emoji so I don’t think it’s meant to be a funny comment.

In that case please explain your point and your eye rolling

Wouldn't have worked tih my child.aa I say though I wouldn't have taken him on a flight at that age. Flew for the first time this year at 8 and I was still wetting myself. Luckily he's really come on so apart from a bit of fear going through security and a LOT of questions he was grand.

The specific point about children nowadays and the vitriol towards a frightened child is horrible, I can understand being annoyed at it if you were on the flight, page after page of grown women villifying a child switch several suggesting he should have been assaulted or his parents are neglectful or soft for not physically restraininghim in his seat for 8 hours is vile. It's ridiculous that anyone feels the need to vent such nonsense about a child and then make and support eye rolling a list nonsense. What is the actual matter with you people

3 year olds can be willful, wriggly and strong so I have a bit of sympathy once they were in that situation.

however my DS was not good at sitting still at all so before we did his first flight we played “going on an aeroplane” with him multiple times so he knew what to expect and was fine. He knew it would be loud and he would be tipped back and he would have to sit in his own seat with a seatbelt on. We also generally had firm boundaries with him so he knew what was important and when he was in trouble.

Because ableism is no more acceptable than racism. Or at least, it shouldn't be.

You didn’t reference all these grown women in the post of yours I quoted. You quoted only one person who only said they would have been livid and would prefer child free flights. I don’t think there’s any vitriol in that.

You immediately assumed I thought the situation was "funny" when nothing in my comment suggested humour. You’re the one projecting malicious or lighthearted intent onto a serious observation and then demanding an explanation for an angle you completely made up in your head. That says more about your own assumptions than what was actually written.

With kindness, you’d be well placed to not try to start arguments based on the narrative in your head. Have a lovely day xx

Were the parents given an ultimatum? Did the stewards explain to them about the time restraints and the possibility of the plane being cancelled? Did the stewards explain to the parents that the child had to be wearing a seatbelt within a certain time?

I am wondering whether the parents were fully aware of the consequences. Maybe the stewards didn't fully make it clear about the situation?

Posters need to stop trying to find excuses to blame the airline.

From the flightradar trace and accounts elsewhere it looks like the crew spent a lot of time trying to resolve this, possibly during taxi out and almost certainly during the 10 minutes or so the aircraft was stationary at the holding point prior to the runway..

I'd be more than fairly certain to 100% confident that during that time the consequences of the child not being strapped in were made very clear to the family, probably more than once.

The basics are simple: if Canadian air law is similar to the rest of the world then child not seated and not restrained by a belt means it's not legal to fly.

Going back to gate to offload family and bags (security requirement) probably meant cancellation was inevitable (night curfew), and certainly the captain and probably the cabin crew would have been fully aware of that.

So IMO in terms of why the flight was cancelled well there's not much to debate -.it was due to the child's behaviour.

Why they behaved like that maybe is up for debate.

I suspect that, once they and their luggage were on the plane, realistically any solution involving them getting off the plane was going to delay the flight, given that they would have had to retrieve the luggage.

I voted YABU as you clearly haven’t read the article properly.

Not sure this is entirely correct - I know what you're saying in principle but Birmingham airport the last few days has problems with its baggage handling systems, so large proportions of the passengers are getting to their holiday and finding their bags haven’t come with them. They seem to be saying they’ll get the bags at some point on their holiday so those bags at least must be flying without their owners. Maybe there’s a way round it when it’s the airports problem rather than a passenger “abandoning” their bags in a complicated badly behaved child ruse!

Youtube is full of videos of people being removed from flights in the US and put into jail. They seem to deal with it pretty effectively but it doesn't appear to actually stop it from happening.

I will never understand why people are allowed alcohol before and during flights.... if that plane came down, you wouldn't stand a prayer of getting out safely with a cabin full of drunks. We don't let people drink and drive but on an aircraft, your impeded reactions could cost lives....

But you could say that about anything. If someone is drunk on a train and there’s an awful incident their impeded reactions may cost lives. It’s possible a drunk car passenger could also cost lives if they behaved like an idiot. A drunk pedestrian could wander out in the road and cause a car to swerve and hit someone else or possibly an object which then kills the people in the car. Unless they make alcohol illegal drunk people generally could cost lives.

I’ve read threads on here where women have admitted bad driving when their children are playing up. One thread was a woman who was trying to find an iPad for their distressed autistic child and they swerved over into another lane. There was another recently I think where two children kept climbing out of their seats and all over the car including pulling the mother’s hair while she was driving. That’s incredibly dangerous and may cost lives if she was to have an accident. So should children in cars be banned?

Scared people on planes could also cost lives. What if someone freezes through fear blocking the aisle in an evacuation? What if someone scared was prescribed a sedative and was slow to move?

I agree incredibly drunk people shouldn’t be allowed to fly. But there are spray already rules for that. Having a glass of wine or two on board isn’t likely to cost lives.