The FAA dictates whether a seat is required. If the family needed a medical exception, it should have given the airline some advance notice.
Do wheelchair-bound paraplegics or quadriplegics just show up aboard a plane without giving the airline some advance notice for medical accommodations?
"They did not want to place the child in ANY seat, that’s the point. They wanted the severely disabled child to be held during take-off, not sitting or ‘propped’ in any seat, first class or not.
The airline has a strong point with the rule as written - I don’t know if there is any possible medical override for such a case. The parents should have planned things better, sure, but they don’t sound like selfish monsters."
It’s not just the airline - it’s the FAA. For all you know, there were FAA inspectors in this flight.
“They didn’t need the coach seat for anyone, because they did not plan for the toddler to occupy ANY seat.”
This is the disingenuous part, sorghum. I’d have more sympathy if they were a bunch of rubes who showed up with n-1 tickets for their party of n and said - oh whoops, we just assumed she would sit on our lap.
They KNEW the intent of having a seat be bought for the child was that the child was supposed to occupy said seat. (Maybe not that particular seat, but A seat.) This is not a family that just fell off the turnip truck. The fact that they didn’t automatically send a member of their party back to coach so there was a seat for the girl next to mom or dad in first class says it all. They wanted to get a free upgrade. Not a free seat.
“I assume they would use an additional belt to secure the 3 year old onto the parent’s lap. It is not a simple safety issue if the rule does not apply to a 23 month old.”
So let’s see. Hmmm. You “assume” they’d use an additional belt. If you were a parent in this situation, would you a) inform the airlines ahead of time so your additional belt would be there or b) just show up and “assume” this additional belt would magically appear?
It’s really frustrating for those of us who actually fly to discuss travel issues with people who don’t. GMT and busdriver are the experts here.
I’ve used “belly-belts” (i.e. an infant seatbelt that secures onto the parent’s belt) within Europe when my kids were under 2. But these belts are banned in the US.
Here’s the FAA page for child restraints. There’s a section for special-needs children:
http://www.faa.gov/passengers/fly_children/
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what the parents are saying is true…that they’ve flown several times with their D and no one has required to her to sit in a seat, then really THAT is the problem. When rules aren’t enforced with regularity, then people will think that they’re arbitrary or easily bent.
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The FAA regs clearly say, one seat, one belt, one person for all of those over 2 years of age (“at least two years of age”).
14 CFR Part 125 Section 211.
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@bluebayou
You’re missing my point. I didn’t mean that there wasn’t a FAA reg. I meant that if people have multiple experiences where the rule isn’t enforced, they will wrongly assume that enforcement is arbitrary…or that there is leeway for disabled people.
While I disagree with how this family handled the situation (should have brought a car seat on board), there are a lot of people who think the ADA Act provides some kind of protection from forced enforcement of regulations that disabled people have difficulty complying with.
This family flies a lot. This child will get older and bigger as time goes on. What will they do when she’s 8 or 10 or 20? They need to be purchasing various FAA-approved products that will provide her the comfort and dignity that she deserves.
That said, I don’t like dumping on a family with a special needs child. These families go thru stresses and fears that some of us can never imagine. Sure, they should have known. Sure, they should have been prepared for the possibly time that a FA would enforce the rule. If anything, this story has provided information to other families who might face this in the future.
The reason they are being dumped on is because they knew the child was expected to sit in her own seat. That’s why they went ahead and purchased a ticket.
You can be darn sure when the FA started to inquire why the child wasn’t in her own seat, they said “there is no seat for her.” Because they hadn’t moved a member back to coach to open up a seat. They knew that each person was supposed to have his/ her own seat - they even said so! Yet they didn’t “create” an open spot for her. That was deliberate. They weren’t acting in good faith. Good faith would be - miss, here’s an empty seat right next to me but as you can see she is unable to sit so we will just hold her. Bad faith is - there’s no empty seat for her to sit in (because were going to hope you don’t notice that there’s an open coach seat we could move a family member back to, but we haven’t).
Make her sit? Telling a parent to make her daughter sit when the daughter can’t sit… This is offensive…
“They did not want to place the child in ANY seat, that’s the point. They wanted the severely disabled child to be held during take-off, not sitting or ‘propped’ in any seat, first class or not”
If that was the only issue, you sit in coach. You lift up the arm rest, and you can wrap your arms around the child. She can also be belted in, and lie on you. You can easily hold a child in your arms that way in coach. So if you’re not willing to put the child in the safety seat that she needs, this is how you do it.
If this was truly the issue, this is what they should have done. Someone in coach would have happily traded with them, no doubt, if there wasn’t an extra seat available. I wonder how long they think they could do this, holding a child in their lap? Until she was ten?
This is a no brainer.
“In Ivy’s case, FAA guidelines recommend an FAA approved child safety seat, something Elit was not aware of until her flight.”
Right. This educated, intelligent well traveled family with multiple children never heard of a car seat. Give me a break, dstark. What do you think the child uses on the ground at home? She uses either a regular car seat or, if needed, a car seat that is structured to accommodate her special needs.
They had 16 members on the flight. 12 premium seats and 4 coach seats. Other family members were apparently occupying coach so the 6 of them in the family could be together in premium. Which makes it all the more egregious because what bdriver and Jym have said is exactly true - you could “create a cocoon” in between parents in coach with armrests up that you couldn’t in first where armrests are typically not movable.
I’m making a wild guess that this family was going to their destination or had a long layover somewhere, not worried about catching a connection. No doubt they would have come up with a quick and legal solution themselves if they had a connection to catch.
Though I’d really like to hear the airline’s side of the story. It just seems unlikely that this would cause a one hour delay. People (particularly frequent flyers) may seem very unsympathetic to this story, and it’s pretty much unbelievable. There would have to be plenty of incompetence on UAL’s side, to not have come up with the obvious and proper solutions quickly.
I also don’t buy that the family did not know the car seat for over 2s rule and yet knew they needed to buy a seat for the girl.
The part about the other 3 FAs finding an exception in the manual is also confusing:
“We would like to clarify certain facts in regard to our service to parents who fly with ‘lap children.’ FAA regulation requires everyone over the age of 24 months to sit in his or her own seat for taxi, takeoff and landing. There is no exception in the regulations or in the United flight attendant manual that allows a lap child over the age of two under any circumstances.”
I still wonder how the child is transported in a car, because I would think if I was flying, or taking a train, or whatever, I would use the same system that worked in the car (and I suspect it is a car seat of some kind).
I have to be honest - I do not believe for one second that the mother was unaware of FAA approved car seats for the child. She has 4 children. I watched the interview and she appears to be very savvy - someone who would make it her business to be aware of such things.
I am not really sure what the families original intent was when they purchased the coach seat, but it rubs me the wrong way when people are not straight forward. Do what you need to do to insure your child’s safety and get the flight off the ground. If that means switching seats with some other family members in economy then so be it. I could not help notice how quiet the husband was during the televised interview.
My instincts tell me that it really all boiled down to two women who rubbed each other the wrong way and both dug their heels in. When really the child’s safety should have been front and center.
I agree. Buying a coach seat no-one wants to sit in doesn’t make any sense and hasn’t been explained, at all.
IMO this mother’s disingenuous statement might apply to her as well as United.
And how is it a “mistake” to attempt to enforce your airlines safety rules?
“My instincts tell me that it really all boiled down to two women who rubbed each other the wrong way and both dug their heels in. When really the child’s safety should have been front and center.”
I have not listened to the interview, but I wonder if that is what the “more to the story is”.
People can get really wrapped up in being “right”, and forget the big picture. There are some really heavy handed, controlling flight attendants out there, that absolutely say things the wrong way to people. Just as there are people like that in all industries. And there are certainly plenty of passengers out there with the same personality characteristics. They are more invested in getting their way than getting the job done, and the problem solved. That is when a supervisor or the captain should step in.
According to a blog source (so unverifiable), the father’s parents had purchased all the tickets with miles and it so happened there were 12 premium and 4 coach (which is believable). The other family members DID fill up the coach spots so this particular family could be together in premium.
Assuming this to be true, then one would think that the FA wanted them to switch with their coach relatives to jury-rig a propped solution better than could be done in premium - and instead of complying, they refused.
It’s also interesting to me that the final solution was propping her between her father and “another relative”, not father and mother.
Some commenters have objected to parents in different cabins than children, which to me is a red herring. In a normal circumstance, I wouldn’t see anything wrong with parents in premium and say, 14 yos in coach.
Busdriver - you know what they say about kettles ;-). (Kettles = people who don’t fly frequently but who are full of all kinds of wisdom about air travel)