Passengers on a Southwest Airlines plane at Houston Hobby Airport (HOU) have been offered just $50 in compensation after their flight was delayed when a naked woman exposed herself in front of everyone and delayed the plane from taking off.
The incident occurred on Monday, March 3, as Southwest flight WN-733 with service to Phoenix Sky Harbor (PHX) was taxiing for takeoff, forcing a return to the gate as stunned passengers looked on.
A video taken by Macy Estevez, who was a passenger on the flight, shows the woman standing at the very front of the Boeing 737, the topless woman gripped onto the overhead bins as she grinned at her audience while jiggling her chest and hysterically laughing.
“She’s probably on mushrooms or acid or something,” Macy says during the roughly one-minute video. “They have to pull over? We’re going to pull over, right?” Macy asked as the incident unfolded.
In another video posted by Macy, the woman is seen pacing up the aisle and cursing at other passengers.
The pilots taxied the aircraft back to the gate, where the plane was met by officers from the Houston Police Department, and the woman was taken to a local hospital for medical evaluation.
In the end, the flight departed Houston just over an hour and a half late, although it made up some of the time in the air.
Macy and other passengers on the plane received an email from Southwest following the incident in which a customer service representative said: “I’m very sorry for the unexpected disturbances that occurred on your flight from Houston to Phoenix yesterday afternoon.”
“I know circumstances onboard became uncomfortable, especially for passengers in the immediate vicinity of the situation themselves. There is nothing we value more than the safety and security of our customers and employees, and I hope you will accept my sincere apology for the overall experience.”
Passengers were proactively offered a $50 future travel voucher as compensation for what they endured on flight 733.
It’s unclear whether the woman faces criminal charges for her behavior. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) also has the power to impose a civil penalty of up to $35,000 per violation of aviation safety rules.
“Just $50?” How much is an airline supposed to offer when the behavior and delay were entirely beyond its control?
It is a nice gesture on the part of WN, especially considering that there surely are dudes on that plane who would have paid $50 to watch such a show. Even with a less than attractive woman performing it.
Why should they offer anything? This is obtuse. And y’all people are so entitled to think you deserve anything here.
Trump immediately put her in charge of the FAA.
That $50 credit is a great public relations gesture as the goodwill it generate$ should definitely be worth more for an incident that was clearly obviously out of WN’s control. Great proactive measure to deter any fools from complaining & demanding compensation ( but I’m sure they’ll be some ). Certainly, not all of the credits will ever be redeemed before their expiration, further diminishing the monetary ‘loss’ to WN.
Glad to see it only delayed the flight by less than 1.5 hours. Hopefully it didn’t result in further cascading delays on the aircraft’s routing and unfortunately wasted fuel in extra taxing & ground handling staff time.
Still, a sad comment on the number of people in the general population who need mental health support….