(Newswire.net— August 4, 2016) —A pilot personally confronted an aggressive passenger who was removed from the airplane and arrested.
Belligerent passengers behaving badly is not unheard of. A pilot tackling a passenger, however, is a rare incident, one that recently happened on an American Airlines flight.
Flight attendants are trained to deal with drunk or rude passengers. In the video posted by American Airlines on social networks, the pilot of the aircraft stepped in and protected his crew.
The video recorded on a smartphone shows a passenger spitting, cursing and even knocking down a flight attendant. The pilot then left the cockpit and tackled the passenger to the ground.
Before physical contact, the pilot and stewardess repeatedly directed the passenger to “take a seat!”
The passenger, identified as Michael Kerr from Lexington, Kentucky, threatened to break the pilot’s jaw. But that was not enough for the pilot to react. The last straw was after Kerr pushed a flight attendant, which caused the pilot to act instantly and subdue Kerr to the floor.
“You don’t put your hands on my flight attendant!” the video shows the pilot saying, while Kerr repeatedly yelled at the pilot that he’s being recorded and will end up on social networks.
“Whatever you do is going on Facebook, and you’re a…complete…loser. You heard me right the first time.”
The witness and videographer of the viral video, Brian Colon, told the Herald-Leader that Kerr was aggravated and wanted to get off the plane, while the pilots waited for the jet-bridge to arrive at the exit door, according to procedure.
Kerr screamed “let’s go, go,” according to Colon.
The flight attendant asked Kerr to sit down. He refused. The police arrived some 15-20 minutes after the incident and arrested Kerr.
Kerr was arraigned in federal court on Monday and charged with being intoxicated and disruptive, assaulting a female, communicating threats and interfering with the flight crew, the Charlotte Observer reported.