A confrontation on a Delta flight from Orlando, Florida, to New York last November ended up with a Virginia family being removed from the airplane — and the husband and father of the family said they have yet to be compensated by Delta.
The husband and father re-posted information about the ordeal on Jan. 30 in a video that has since gone viral after he failed to hear anything substantive from Delta about their poor experience, he told Fox News Digital in a phone interview, plus emailed comments.
The male passenger and his wife and children boarded a Delta flight to LaGuardia Airport in New York City on the afternoon of Nov. 7, 2022. (The passenger asked for his family's names to be omitted for privacy.)
"After we sat down in our seats, the lady next to my wife had nowhere for her bag to go," the passenger said.
The traveler said he got up and tried to assist the other passenger. "I tried to move our stuff around to make enough room, but was unable to make [the] bag fit," he said.
The passenger, who said he was in Comfort Plus coach seating, said he asked first class passengers in front of him if he might put the bag in one of their overhead bins. They all said, "No problem," he noted.
"At this point the flight attendant started to yell at me," he said, because those bins are "only for first class."
Calling her attitude immediately "hostile," the traveler said the flight attendant then placed the passenger’s kids’ backpacks at their feet and attempted to place his oversized backpack at his feet after pulling it from an overhead bin.
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"I told her, ‘No, I will not put it at my feet,’" the passenger said. "'First, I paid for Comfort Plus and I’m not losing my legroom with my bag when I paid for the upgraded seat.'"
He continued, "When she realized my bag was too big [for underneath the seat] she took it out of one bin and slammed it in the other bin and stormed off."
He added, "At this point we thought she was done being a jerk to us."
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Soon, the airline's safety video began playing on individual TV screens as part of the pre-takeoff routine, he said.
"She stands right in front of us, and I’m not looking up at her, so she asks very rudely for me to watch the video, saying I ‘might learn something,’" he said.
"I pointed out that I was watching the TV in front of me," said the airline passenger.
He said that the flight attendant then looked at his wife and said, "Don’t look at me with that stupid face."
The traveler said his wife asked the attendant what she said, "and then the lady [attendant] says that she is from the Bronx and ‘you don’t want this.'"
"At this point I started to video her," the traveler said, noting that his family stayed calm. "We never raised our voices," he said.
The flight attendant "informed us we would be kicked off the plane, and that I was not allowed to video her," he added.
He continued, "I informed her that ‘when you talk to us the way you are talking to us, I will 100% video you.’"
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He also said, "Still, we were not getting upset, but we could not believe this lady could talk to us the way she did."
Soon, about "five people come on to remove us from the flight," he said. "Once we saw them, we immediately got up and pleasantly walked off the plane."
The passenger told the authorities present what happened, he said, noting he was "still very calm." He also showed them the video he had taken, he said.
"They told us she was in the wrong and apologized to us," he said. "The captain of the plane came out and talked to us and agreed there was no reason to remove us from the flight."
When the flight attendant heard this development, the passenger said, she said that she "refused to be on the plane with us because she now feels unsafe."
He added, "At this point we were told if she refuses to be on the plane, then the flight will be canceled, because they do not have a replacement for her."
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He continued, "So, to avoid inconveniencing everyone on the plane, we asked if they can get us on another flight home, and they said, ‘Yes.'"
Noting that the airline then flew his family flew home "first class," he said that several airline personnel — from gate agents to supervisors — could not believe how his family was treated, "and that we stayed calm."
The traveler said, "We did not ask for anything free, just that this flight attendant be disciplined or fired for how she spoke to us."
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The air traveler said the family is still waiting for further communication from Delta after initial positive communication with the airline.
Saying that the airline at first called their relationship a "partnership," a Delta representative asked the gentleman to remove his video from all social media — which he says he did.
Since then, he has heard nothing, he said — which prompted him to re-post the video on Jan 30.
"It’s sad this is how Delta treats their Platinum and Gold medallion members," the traveler said.
Under his re-posted video, the traveler wrote, in part, that a Delta representative said that he "and his team sat down and compared our ordeal to a hair in a Caesar salad to understand how to compensate us."
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The passenger said, "We were blown away with how far off this guy is. We were told over and over again how appreciative they were of our patience. It seems all they wanted to do is let time play out and hope we forget and go away."
The passenger shared with Fox News Digital a communication from the airline in which they apologized for the salad comparison — and noted they were not trying to compare the two experiences.
The passenger has asked the airline to have his family's Delta memberships upgraded to "Medallion" status, he said, but has yet to hear back from the airline with a reply to his request.
Fox News Digital reached out to Delta Air Lines for comment.
"We apologize for the delay in travel for all customers on Flight 1260 from Orlando to LaGuardia on Nov. 7, 2022, after the flight crew made the decision to deplane some customers shortly after departure," said a statement from Delta provided to Fox News Digital.
"Those customers were rebooked on another Delta flight and we've been in contact with this party to offer further apologies and compensation," the Delta statement also said.
