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Who's to Blame
ChrisCrossings · April 26, 2001

Last week's column about intoxicated airline passengers went over like a proverbial lead balloon. Numerous readers were upset that I suggested gate agents should ultimately be responsible for either allowing drunken travelers on the plane or denying them boarding. Here are two of the responses:

Q: The bottom-line issue here is one of responsibility. I'm now a 50-year veteran of aviation and a 70-year veteran of life and it is getting increasingly difficult to adjust to the muddled thinking so prevalent in today's society.

The latest moral gaffe on this subject is the statement by a recent DUI arrestee: "They should have seen that I was drunk when I got on the airplane."

So, clearly, this man feels that if he drinks too much, he becomes someone else's problem, not his own. Carry this hokum to its logical conclusion and you arrive at a place where we have to set up parameters to protect this bozo, such as all the convoluted solutions we see offered.

How many drinks should flight attendants serve? Should airlines serve drinks at all? You've offered a litany of feather-headed solutions to a problem that didn't exist 50 years ago. Time was, ff you got drunk and screwed up, you paid the consequences ... what a concept!

An oversimplification? Maybe, but where's a better answer? Two hundred and fifty people on an airplane can't have a drink because one of them might not be able to handle it? Breath tests at the gate? One drink per person? Maybe we could put something in that controlled air environment that puts all the boozers to sleep?

-- Neil Bennett

A: As I re-read my response from last week, I agree that I should have mentioned something about the passenger's responsibility. I note that in virtually every case of "DUI" in the sky involving interference with a flight crew, the passenger is held responsible.

Maybe the question should have been phrased differently. Who else is responsible? I said gate agents are the ones who can prevent intoxicated passengers from boarding, and I still believe it's largely up to them.

But is it the gate agents who are at fault for the traveler's intoxication? Hardly.

Q: I think your conclusion that shifting the blame onto airport agents for boarding inebriated passengers on flights ignores a pretty obvious source for blame - the drunken passengers themselves.

Why aren't they ultimately held responsible for their consumption of alcohol? When did airline passengers lose their control of alcohol consumption?

Bartenders and flight attendants don't force-feed alcohol to their customers. I have never seen a bartender drag some unwilling passenger off of an airport concourse and pour a drink down the gullet of the man or woman. I've never seen a flight attendant beg or plead for a passenger to slam down another bourbon or scotch - although I have watched more than a handful of passengers sneak miniature liquor bottles off of beverage carts while flight attendants served other passengers. And I've seen quite a few passengers sneak drinks out of their own flasks after they made sure the flight attendants weren't looking.

Also, I believe you did not think through your conclusion that, "it's the gate agents ... who should be responsible for preventing this DUI-in-the-sky nonsense." Unless a person exhibits "classic" inebriated behavior (staggering or unbalanced movements, slurred, agitated or excessively loud speech, etc., while the smell of alcohol is distinctly noticeable) I would have a difficult time convincing a supervisor (or the passenger's legal counsel or a civil jury) why I kept passenger off of an airplane.

Unquestionably, some agents have knowingly allowed inebriated passengers to board flights, despite federal regulations that prohibit this. But, if in the judgment of the agent - and that's all the agent can rely on - these passengers did not overtly display the kind of unequivocal behavior that most of us recognize as public intoxication, does the agent have the right to keep a passenger from boarding a flight based upon a suspicion that the passenger could get rowdy or unruly on the flight?

-- Bob Braun

A: At the risk of repeating myself, let me agree that the passenger is ultimately responsible for his or her behavior. Inebriated travelers who mess with the flight crew either pay fines or go to prison.

I'm disappointed that no one responded to my suggestion that the government exempt flights from reporting on-time departure statistics where these kinds of safety issues are concerned. That would take the pressure off gate agents and give them time to decide if a questionable passenger could fly or not.

Let me go one step further this week. A few years ago, several airlines quietly began giving their cabin crews greater power to deal with disruptive passengers. To quote American Airlines spokesman John Hotard, "[We've] done a complete 180-degree turn, from an attitude of 'the customer is always right' to 'the customer is not always right. We started backing the flight crews in disputes with passengers." (Unfortunately, the policy also resulted in a lot of innocent passengers getting kicked off flights, but that's a topic for another column.)

I would argue that the same powers should be given to gate agents. If there's any reason to believe that passengers are going to be disruptive, they should be escorted out of the terminal. It's far cheaper than turning the flight around to make an emergency landing.

Or, God forbid, trying to survive a plane crash.

Christopher Elliott's column appears on Thursdays. All e-mailed questions to ChrisCrossings become property of Ticked.com and may be edited, condensed or republished at the site's discretion. You may reach Elliott at chris@ticked.com. Or visit his home page at http://www.elliott.org.