The pilots of a United Airlines flight from Shanghai to San Francisco are estimated to have dumped up to $50,000 worth of fuel to divert the plane to Tokyo Narita after a ‘confused’ Chinese woman who didn’t speak English got involved in a ‘small quarrel’ with a flight attendant, a passenger who witnessed the entire incident has claimed.
The diversion occurred on Wednesday, June 24, little more than two hours into United Airlines flight UA-858, which was supposed to be an 11-hour transpacific flight from Shanghai Pudong (PVG) to San Francisco International Airport (SFO).
The Boeing 777-300 aircraft with 285 passengers and 16 crew members on board departed Shanghai at around 12:43 pm on Wednesday, and immediately headed eastbound towards the North Pacific Ocean.
The nine-year-old aircraft climbed to a cruising altitude of 31,000 feet as passengers settled in for the first meal service, but in the Economy cabin, trouble started to brew almost immediately after takeoff.
According to an eyewitness who was sitting just across the aisle from the alleged ‘unruly passenger,’ her passenger changed very quickly after takeoff. She had appeared ‘normal’ as she boarded the plane, politely conversing with flight attendants to confirm her seat, but that all changed as soon as the wheels of the plane left the ground.
“She tossed all the documents in her seat pockets in the air, shouted cuss words periodically, and also periodically started hitting herself,” the witness explained.
“She then started acting rudely towards the flight attendants as if trying to grab their attention,” the witness added. When the flight attendants questioned what she was up to, she claimed the crew members were trying to “oppress” her.
The flight attendants attempted to de-escalate the situation and called upon the purser to speak with the woman. By the time she arrived, however, the woman appeared to be sleeping with her eyes closed.
“The crew captain [purser] tapped several times on her shoulder for her attention. In a startle reflex without even seeing who it was, she elbowed back, as if saying don’t touch me. The crew captain started scolding the old lady like a child, and soon after started yelling back and forth.”
“Later, when she was given food, she threw all the trash on the floor, making a mess in her row,” the account continued.
When the flight attendants left, the woman attempted to show ‘evidence’ to the other passengers that she was being oppressed.
Not long after, the passengers were told that the plane was diverting to Tokyo Narita. The pilots reportedly started to dump fuel to reduce the weight of the aircraft so that it could land safely in Tokyo.
Upon arrival in Tokyo, the police boarded the plane and headed to the elderly woman’s seat to remove her. At this point, though, the witness says everyone was confused as to why, exactly, the woman was being removed.
Not only did the woman appear to be confused about why she was being confused, but also the police officers who were tasked with having her deplaned… by force, if necessary.
“Personally, I felt it was a mix of misunderstanding, overreaction, and mismanagement from both sides,” the witness said of the whole incident. “Obviously, it was concerning and wrong to lash out towards the Flight crew, yet I also felt the handling of the issue by the crew was semi-unprofessional.”
“I do feel pity for the old lady, as nobody was able to assess her side of the story, as she was obviously met with some disability or triggering event, which the lack of communication and patience from the flight attendants in understanding what was happening led to the escalation in this fiasco,” the witness added.
Unfortunately, once on the ground at Tokyo Narita, that wasn’t the end of the drama for all the other passengers as the plane then showed a maintenance fault that needed to be fixed before it could continue its journey to San Francisco.
In the end, the plane didn’t end up departing Tokyo Narita until 6:14 pm, arriving in San Francisco around an hour and 40 minutes later than scheduled on June 25.
Matt’s take
This is one of those situations where it can be really difficult for passengers to understand the decision-making process that is being made by the flight attendants and pilots, even though they feel like they’ve witnessed exactly what is going on.
It’s likely that the elderly passenger had a medical condition that caused her to act as she did, and the crew probably decided that it was best to de-escalate the situation by limiting contact with her, especially as the flight attendants appeared to be the trigger for her behavior, claiming they were trying to ‘oppress’ her.
Nonetheless, the pilots have to assess whether the situation is manageable for the remainder of an 11-hour transpacific flight with limited diversion points should her behavior deteriorate further.
While it might seem like diverting the plane to have the passenger removed by police is extreme, it might be the most humane way to deal with this type of situation.
