Parents treated like criminals for trying to calm 2-year-old son.
By Raif Karerat
WASHINGTON, DC: An Indian American family who flew JetBlue on Monday say they were unfairly kicked off a flight after being falsely accused of refusing flight attendants’ instructions to put their 2-year-old in his seat. The family is adamant that their son was seated and buckled in, yet the flight crew booted them off the plane anyway.
Mona Doshi and her husband were flying from Boston to Baltimore after a family vacation when their young son, Milin, began to cry. Doshi told Yahoo Parenting that on the earlier flight to Boston, flight attendants allowed her to seat the 2-year-old on her lap.
“We did buy him a seat,” she said, citing rules that children over the age of 2 have their own ticket, “but he was squirmy, so I held him for takeoff and didn’t know there was anything wrong with that.”
On Monday night, as they prepared for the return leg of their journey, a flight attendant approached Doshi before takeoff and told her Milin needed to be in his own seat. Doshi alleges she was perfectly fine with the protocol, but did ask some questions since the instructions differed from their first flight.
According to Doshi, “She said, ‘These are the rules. I’ve been flying for nine years and I do know what I’m talking about.’ She got very defensive very quickly, but when she said that I got him in his seat and was buckling him in.”
When a second flight attendant approached less than a minute later with the same instructions, Doshi admits she was a bit irritated, and replied, “Okay, I got it. I got the lecture and I’m putting him in his seat.”
The flight attendant responded by stating it “wasn’t a lecture” and that she could “turn this plane around.”
Doshi explained that she understood the message, and focused on calming her son down, who was in his seat but now crying. While she was getting Milin settled in, her husband, Prashant, noticed the aircraft was rolling back toward the terminal.
The pilot then got on the loudspeaker and said they were returning to the gate because of “noncompliant passengers.”
Doshi and her husband subsequently hit the call button in an effort to get a grasp of what was transpiring, but none of the cabin crew would respond.
“All of a sudden the captain came and ordered us off the plane. We asked questions, but he wouldn’t answer, Doshi explained to Yahoo. “He just kept repeating, ‘Get your bags, get off the plane.’ We were treated like criminals.”
“… [It was] as if we were terrorists,” she remarked to CBS affiliate WUSA, which was first to break the story.
In a statement to the news station, JetBlue claimed the crew took appropriate action on the grounds of maintaining a “safe and comfortable” environment.
However, Doshi told Yahoo that safety wasn’t the issue, as Milin was seated in accordance with the rules.
“I don’t think it had anything to do with safety at all. I think they thought we were being noncompliant, but if they looked they would have seen we were complying. He was in his seat and I was holding him down, and that’s why he was crying,” she says. “I think they were annoyed because they thought I was rude, but I never raised my voice. And there are plenty of people on planes who don’t comply with instructions right away … and they don’t get kicked off the plane. I thought it was a completely unreasonable action to take. Maybe they didn’t like that Milin was crying, but he wasn’t dangerous, he wasn’t throwing things or running through the aisle.”
Other passengers who witnessed the incident unfold tweeted about the perceived inappropriateness of the airline’s actions.
“Hey @JetBlue about 20 of us just witnessed your flight attendants power tripping and throw off @doshspy555 and his family for no good reason,” wrote Mark Towfiq. “The only effect it had (aside from boosting the egos of the attendants) was to make us all late and less enthusiastic about flying @JetBlue,” he continued.
Another passenger tweeted, “The nicest family just got kicked off a plane unnecessarily. Disappointed in @JetBlue,” before adding, “They told them to put their son in his seat & they did. JB didn’t like that they questioned them.”
The family was able to board another flight later that day, which took off without incident.
Doshi, who travels often for work and has never seen someone thrown off a plane, believes the airline unfairly ostracized her family.
“They had no sensitivity to it and made no effort at all to try to resolve a situation with a squirmy toddler, even though I don’t think it was a situation. The total lack of understanding or patience with our questions to me demonstrates unfair treatment of a family, and I would assume other families are treated the same way.”
According to WABC, the day before, another Indian family had a near identical outcome after celebrating their son’s third birthday at Disney World. Their son was crying, so the plane returned to the gate and the family was kicked off the plane.