Clearly wrong customer causes Jet Blue Flight Attendant row

Steven Slater, a career flight attendant, came to the tipping point. A superb flight attendant for over 20 years, a traveler thought it was appropriate to mistreatment him for doing his job. The Jet Blue flight attendant stormed off, went on a tirade of his own over the intercom and then employed the emergency chute and took off on foot down the tarmac. He has been charged with reckless endangerment and criminal mischief among other things.

That he had enough abuse is plane to see

Jet Blue Flight 1052 was arriving at JFK International Airport from Pittsburgh according to CNN. As the plane taxied toward the terminal, a passenger stood up to retrieve his bag too early, and he was told by flight attendant Steven Slater he had to sit back down. Precisely what happened isn’t known, but it is clear that Slater was struck by either the bag falling from the overhead bin or the passenger struck him. The passenger swore at Slater after refusing to apologize. Slater took over the intercom, cursed the cretin, and announced he was quitting. He took beer from the galley and used the emergency chute to exit the plane. Hours later, he was arrested at home.

Cabin pressure

Slater barely had a moment’s rest at home when not working, MSN. His roommate reported that Slater often flew to Thousand Oaks, Calif., to care for his ailing mother, as he had done for his father. His mother was a career flight attendant also, as outlined by the New York Times. His father, formerly a pilot, had died from Lou Gehrig’s Disease.

Customers really can be wrong

The service trades are not as easy as one might think, and they should not be maltreated at all. Any person who has worked within the service trades for any length of time, be it in a restaurant or movie theater, knows just how awful the public could be at times. Mistakes do sometimes get made, but cooperating and being polite cost nothing.

More on this topic

MSNBC

msnbc.msn.com/id/38629517/ns/travel-news/

CNN

cnn.com/2010/TRAVEL/08/10/new.york.escape.chute.opened/?hpt=C2

NY Times

nytimes.com/2010/08/10/nyregion/10attendant.html?_r=1 and hp