Overbooking At United Leads To Forced Physical Removal (Passenger Knocked Unconscious)

I don’t usually report on these types of things, but I was pretty shocked by the raw footage and United’s response. Flight 3411 from Chicago to Louisville was overbooked, United asked for volunteers to receive compensation to be “bumped” to a later flight. Apparently they were unable to get enough volunteers, so instead they bumped a passenger. That passenger refused to leave the plane, law enforcement was called and then this took place:

It seems that passenger was then able to get back on the plane:

It’s alleged that the passenger that was forcibly removed was a doctor that needed to see patients the following morning. You can view United’s official twitter responses below to this incident:

I’m sure there is a lot more to this situation and story, and I’ll update this post as more comes to light.

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John Adams
John Adams (@guest_391087)
April 18, 2017 00:23

Wow, the best video quality of the United debacle I’ve seen so far. Great job DoC!

Eric
Eric (@guest_388879)
April 13, 2017 08:45

I am so glad that the Chinese passenger is suing United. United gets 100% what they deserve. Also the United CEO Oscar Munoz should be fired for his handling of the situation. There are too many recent incidents within the past year where the stance that United took was unacceptable. I have no pity on United and they better do something for their frequent flyers to make up for this incident.

Be warned Delta and American Airlines, do not even try to pull this crap of booting a passenger involuntarily or they will face the wrath the same way that United is facing right now.

brandonr1985
brandonr1985 (@guest_388457)
April 12, 2017 14:01

Hey Will, just an idea, but could/would you do a write up on compensation for missed/delayed flights? I didn’t know that existed until a delayed British Airways flight got cancelled and I was able to get $400+ direct deposited to me plus expenses within a few days from BA. These flights were in Europe. I know this would probably be great info for your readers and I’m not sure how the process would work in the USA. Just my 2 cents 😉

Thanks for the great info on your site!

Bradley Priesmeyer
Bradley Priesmeyer (@guest_387774)
April 11, 2017 12:53

1. Fuck United.
2. We need regulations in place that penalize the airline when they make mistakes in their scheduling. THEY need to be the ones taking ownership of their mistakes instead of passing their problems on to the paying customers because they don’t know how to accommodate their employee’s flying.

My opinion? Impose a minimum of $2,000 that must be compensated if they have to boot people. That will make them think twice before saying “ehhh, sell those seats anyways, we will boot 4 people if needed”.

Gerry
Gerry (@guest_387687)
April 11, 2017 11:03

The more facts that trickle out the worse this looks for United. I’ve watched even conservative commentators who were horrified by this action. The passenger did nothing wrong. They purchased a ticket and BOARDED the plane. This reason for this wasn’t an overbooking situation, it was extremely inept planning on the part of the airline and they just decided to make it the passengers problem instead of their own. The airline clearly abused their carriage prerogative; deciding to cheap out. What they should have done if they wanted employees on that flight was to keep raising the compensation until there was some takers. Major, major fail on UAL’s part – and the icing on the cake was their completely tone deaf message to their employees. Bottom line, we need to have those regulations tightened up and require airlines to pay more money if they decide to bump people off their planes to make it painful to them. The “voluntary compliance” method isn’t working.

sara
sara (@guest_387771)
April 11, 2017 12:52

very good points!!

Alan
Alan (@guest_387824)
April 11, 2017 13:51

Exactly. People keep saying this was an overbooking case. No, the flight was fully booked when the 4 united personnel showed up. Huge difference.

test
test (@guest_387548)
April 11, 2017 05:48

Is there any racial bias in the bump selection?
No and Yes.
At first people should stop claiming that the selection itself is based on race, which can be easily dismissed by the fact that not all bumped passengers were Asian-American. According to UA policy it is some revenue-based automated selection by computers.
However, since Asians (remember it’s only 5% of US population) are more educated, more budget savvy, and more involved in MS/FF, it is likely that Asian Americans enjoy an over-representation among the thousands who are involuntarily bumped each year.
Now, if you agree with liberals that blacks are subject to criminal injustice, simply because of the high percentage of African Americans in prison, I think it’s also fair to say there is a racial discrimination against Asians in the field of air transportation.

Is there any racial bias in the physical removal?
Of course.
You mean, would the UA manager let Officer John Smith violently remove Dr. Jamal from the plane and see ORD get burnt down within 24 hours by BLM? I don’t think this will ever happen.
The manager had some street smart and used racial profiling responding to the tense situation. He sent in the security anyway and expected that the Asian guy would easily comply, and that there would be no further confrontation or escalation, and that no one would care about the Asian as usual.
He is wrong this time, which is why we should never discriminate. Not all African Americans are criminal or should be shot like a criminal. Not all Asian American are pussy or should be beaten like a pussy.

CM
CM (@guest_387691)
April 11, 2017 11:04

You are saying that Asians are more budget savvy prone to MS etc. Yet this individual let go of a good $800? Comeon this foolish and beyond stereotyping; guess with such comments United and other airlines are bound to continue with this.

Alex Wu
Alex Wu (@guest_387461)
April 11, 2017 00:50

We can’t allow airlines treating passengers like animals.
If the company overbooked, the should keep increasing the incentive until someone volunteers.
There should be some kind of limit on how much overbooking airlines can do.
I am a Chinese American very proud of my adopted country. United put shames on all of Americans. This is much worse than in China where human rights is a long standing issue. Now this news is everywhere in China. The spin is racial discrimination.

Forget about civil courtesy, this is criminal.
UA CEO needs to apologize, more sincerely to all Americans.

XP1
XP1 (@guest_387448)
April 11, 2017 00:17

United: After his “refusal to volunteer”, now, it was only a simple matter of graceful “re-accommodation” by getting the customer beat up, face slammed, and dragged out of the plane.

MontyFC
MontyFC (@guest_387425)
April 10, 2017 23:31

Just read United CEO’s letter to his employees about this incident. Pretty tone deaf. Did he not realize that this was turning into social media nightmare? Did he not realize that a tone-deaf letter can easily be released online and can make a bad situation worse?

stacker
stacker (@guest_387405)
April 10, 2017 22:58

I don’t know what’s in the terms. If they say a passenger can be removed if a flight is overbooked then I don’t have much sympathy for him. Did someone try to talk to him reasonably first? People usually respond better if they are talked to in a reasonable way. In the video it seems like he may have some mental issues. Obviously United could have handled it better although that doesn’t mean they broke any laws.