-Caveat Lector-
>From Christian Science Monitor
> WEDNESDAY, JUNE 16, 1999
>
> <Picture>e-mail this story to a friend
>
>
> Protecting travelers from acts of 'air rage'
>
> How airlines, lawmakers, and passenger-rights groups combat dangerous
> acts by unruly fliers.
>
> Ruth Walker
> Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
>
> TORONTO
>
> <Picture: GLOBAL_REPORT>
>
> Flight attendant Renée Sheffer has been an authority on "air rage" -
> airline-passenger disruption or violence in flight - ever since a
> December 1997 encounter at 35,000 feet.
>
> The passenger in question seemed nice enough at the start of the US
> Airways flight from Los Angeles to Baltimore, she says. But somewhere
> in mid-flight, he began behaving erratically. He warned the plane
> would crash. Then he started moving toward the cockpit.
>
> Ms. Sheffer, a nurse before she started her 14-year career with the
> airlines, drew on all her training to try to calm the man and get him
> back into his seat. But he became physically violent, throwing her
> over three rows of seats. She worked with two of her male colleagues -
> another flight attendant and an off-duty pilot - to restrain him
> physically and secure him for the flight's duration. The man later
> admitted he had taken LSD.
>
> Had he succeeded in storming the cabin, he might have brought down the
> Boeing 757 with all 166 people aboard. Had that happened, Sheffer
> says, "more people would have died than in the Oklahoma City bombing."
>
> <Picture>APPROACH: A British Airways jet lands in Hong Kong. The
> carrier has moved to crack down on passengers whose actions endanger
> others. AP
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> --
>
>
> Air rage may be one of those problems that seems to be getting worse
> mainly because it's finally being addressed. But the potential
> seriousness of recent incidents like the one involving Sheffer have
> government regulators and the airline industry - despite occasional
> tensions - jointly taking note.
>
> Canada's transport ministry, called Transport Canada, is now launching
> a campaign intended to inform the traveling public that verbal or
> physical abuse of airline staff will not be tolerated.
>
> Denise Hill, a representative of the Canadian flight attendants' union
> and a member of Transport Canada's working group on disruptive
> passengers, says: "We're making it clear that this is happening, and
> that it's not going to be treated lightly."
>
> In the past, she says, there's been a tendency to "plea-bargain away"
> the seriousness of abuse and assaults against flight crews. The
> campaign, to be launched next month, will involve clearly posted signs
> in airports, and printed reminders in passengers' ticket envelopes.
>
> Britain is another leader on this issue, acting forcefully to
> prosecute cases of inflight assault. Since April, British airlines
> have been systematically logging all incidents reported by flight
> crews.
>
> Britain has also formed a working group on disruptive passengers, with
> representatives from several government ministries. And British
> Airways has had in place since last year a "yellow card" system -
> mirroring the soccer warning - that warns offending passengers they
> could face charges unless they alter their behavior.
>
>
>
> American moves, too
>
>
>
> In the United States, the House of Representatives has held hearings
> on in-flight violence. Legislation has been introduced into the Senate
> to increase fines for those disruptive passengers and to make it
> easier to arrest in-flight offenders.
>
> <Picture: ALSO IN TODAY'S MONITOR>• The Bush blitz
> • Asian blame games
> • Weighing Moscow's gains
>
> New passenger-rights guarantees requiring airlines to be forthcoming
> with information about overbooking and delays are also in the works.
> Major US airlines reportedly postponed the release of a draft 12-point
> plan earlier this month that could ultimately commit airlines to
> paying closer attention to passenger needs, especially during long,
> on-aircraft delays. Around the world, air rage has gone from being a
> problem the airlines don't want to talk about, in part out of concern
> about driving away revenue, to one on which several are introducing
> "zero-tolerance" policies, including support for flight attendants who
> press charges against passengers: British Airways, British Midland,
> Canadian Airlines, Air Canada, KLM, Cathay Pacific, Swissair, and some
> charter carriers are doing so.
>
> "I'm very attracted to the level of commitment that the airlines have
> been demonstrating in dealing with this issue," says Jim Marriott,
> Transport Canada's director of security policy and legislation.
>
> Since the assault against Sheffer, she and her husband have launched
> the Skyrage Foundation to fight air rage worldwide. "It was time to
> make noise so I decided to make it," says Michael Sheffer. Through his
> Web site (www.skyrage.org) and e-mail, he's been in touch with people
> "from New York to California, in South Africa, the UK, France,
> Belgium, Australia, Canada."
>
> One of the Sheffers' key proposals: a blood-alcohol limit for air
> passengers. Similarly, air-safety advocates in Britain have suggested
> that travelers who appear intoxicated be required to pass a
> Breathalyzer test before boarding.
>
>
>
> How real an issue?
>
>
>
> No one who has flown recently would have trouble coming up with a list
> of reasons passengers might well become agitated during airline trips:
> alcohol, frustration over increasingly widespread smoking bans,
> high-density seating, and delays. Accounts of air rage may capture
> public attention because they represent what may be people's fears
> about the effects of stress.
>
> <Picture>60 DAYS IN JAIL: Briton Bryan Neal taunted photographers
> before pleading guilty last month in a US court to interfering with a
> flight crew, and in a state court to lesser charges, after a row on a
> flight from Florida to Britain that diverted to Bangor, Maine. AP
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> --
>
>
> But Angela Dahlberg, an airline consultant based in Calgary, Alberta,
> says that any statistics on air rage should be kept in perspective.
>
> The airlines call serious incidents very rare, especially on regularly
> scheduled airlines. British carriers, for example, transported 85
> million passengers in 1998, with only about 100 extreme cases of
> unruly passengers reported.
>
> But definitions differ widely. Sen. Harry Reid (D) of Nevada, a
> frequent traveler and a sponsor of a bill on air rage, says, "There
> are hundreds, I think we can say thousands, of these incidents every
> year.... It's a real serious problem."
>
> One figure frequently cited and ascribed to the International Air
> Transport Association is "a 400 percent increase in incidents of air
> rage since 1995." But spokesman Tim Goodyear in Geneva says that
> figure was merely presented at an IATA conference and "is not an IATA
> statistic."
>
> Hence the importance of the British airlines' database. Says Capt.
> Mike Vivian, head of flight operations for Britain's Civil Aviation
> Authority, "We take incidents of 'air rage' extremely seriously and
> are working with government and the industry to attack the problem.
> This new database will help us to provide that information."
>
>
>
> Conflicts hinder enforcement
>
>
>
> In the battle against air rage, both airline flight crews and airline
> management are on the same side. But the crews are on the front lines
> and the "bean counters" aren't. Transport Canada's Mr. Marriott
> acknowledges that both "may not have exactly the same incentives" to
> deal with the problem.
>
> Cynthia Kain, a spokeswoman for the Association of Flight Attendants
> in Washington, is more blunt: "The more carriers have to pay money to
> divert planes [to deplane unruly passengers] the sooner they will put
> in policies that really make a difference."
>
> Ms. Dahlberg sees the airlines' problems with unruly passengers as
> rooted in the fundamental conflict between the need to keep up
> clockwork "production" under stringent operating regulations while
> also paying attention to the service aspects of the work.
>
> There is also a failure to understand the mindset of passengers, she
> suggests. However mobile people in many cultures have become, research
> indicates that a majority of the traveling public has some trepidation
> about flying, she says.
>
> But Dahlberg faults the airlines for their "authoritarian" approach,
> which she says emphasizes "safety" - as defined by regulators - at the
> expense of service. "There doesn't have to be a conflict between
> safety and service."
>
> Airlines need to realize, she adds, that with all the stresses of
> travel, "when people come on board a plane, they are indirectly crying
> for nurturing, caring." She would like to see airlines approach air
> rage through more of a "know your customer" effort, and less of a
> "crime and punishment" model.
>
> Still, in-flight violence is a criminal matter and making it easier to
> prosecute those who assault crews is widely seen as key. In the US,
> aviation is an area of federal jurisdiction. Arrests have had to be
> made by a federal agent from Customs, Immigration, or the Secret
> Service. Senator Reid's bill - the Safe and Friendly Skies Bill of
> 1999 - would deputize local law-enforcement officials to make such
> arrests.
>
> Internationally, there has been a similar problem: Local gendarmes are
> not always able to arrest a troublemaker who has just landed in a
> foreign-flag aircraft. Canada, the US, Australia, and most recently
> Britain are among countries that have corrected this problem with
> legislation.
>
> • Alexander MacLeod contributed to this report from London.
A<>E<>R
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