[tabi] =?utf-8?Q?Blind_man_kicked_off_? =?utf-8?Q?plane_when_guide_dog_? =?utf-8?Q?gets_restless_â_and? =?utf-8?Q?_when_passengers_revo? =?utf-8?Q?lt,_flight_canceled_?X-MB-Message-Source: WebUI
- From: mccaulo@xxxxxxxxxxxx
- To: tabi@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 14 Nov 2013 20:03:35 -0500 (EST)
From newyorkdailynews.com:
A blind man said he and his service dog were kicked off a plane at
Philadelphia International Airport on Wednesday, after he couldn’t keep
the pooch still.
But the flight was canceled after several other passengers argued the
move was too severe.
The wild ordeal unfolded after Albert Rizzi and his dog, Doxy, boarded
a U.S. Airways flight bound for MacArthur Airport in Long Island.
Passengers told WABC-TV that the flight attendant would not allow the
plane to take off about 8 p.m. untilthe Golden Lab curled up under the
seat.
But the guide dog grew more restless as the plane waited on the tarmac
more than an hour — and a woman sitting next to Rizzi even offered her
seat to allow the pooch more room.
“You’ve got about a minute to get this straightened out,” the flight
attendant told Rizzi, according to a passenger on the plane.
“He tried to do whatever he could, and she went back to the front of
the plane,” the passenger told the news station.
Suddenly, the pilot announced that the plane would be turning back to
the gate, where the flight attendant escorted Rizzi off the aircraft.
“The lady comes back and gets very insistent,” Rizzi, of Bellport,
N.Y., told the news station. “And I said, ‘Look, I don’t understand
what you want me to do. ... He’s as best as he can, where he needs to
be.’”
He said he didn’t realize right away that he was getting kicked off the
flight.
“I hear nobody else moving, and as I’m walking to the front, I’m like,
‘Wait a second, why am I the only one getting off?’” he recalled.
But that’s when others aboard the plane tried to intervene.
“We all kind of raised our voices and said this is a real problem,” the
passenger said. “So the captain winds up coming out of the cockpit, and
he basically asked us all to leave the aircraft.”
Officials with the airline told NBC Philadelphia that Rizzi became
verbally abusive and couldn’t control his dog, which they maintain was
wandering down the aisle.
But passengers said the flight attendant was unwilling to compromise
with Rizzi.
Rizzi and several others took a bus home.
Airline officials said they weren’t offering any refunds as the
incident was still under investigation.
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