PASSENGER: I CAN’T BELIEVE WHAT HAPPENED ON FLIGHT
‘Bizarre’ event unexpected, unreal and uncalled for
Jayse Anspach was heading home from a nine-day trip to Greece helping refugees from Syria, Afghanistan and Iran when his United Airlines flight took a dive into the “bizarre.”
A doctor sitting next to him was dragged out of his seat to help make room for four crew members. The “humiliating” treatment of the physician left Anspach, 25, a graduate student in theology, feeling frustrated. Sunday’s Chicago-to-Louisville hop was the final leg of his journey, yet it proved to be the most troubling.
Here is his story as told to the Herald’s Joe Dwinell:
“It was unexpected and unreal. On one hand, I’m not surprised. We live in a fallen world where people are inclined to do evil things. But it was messed up to see how that guy was humiliated.
People should be given some respect. It was disturbing.
We were all in the plane trying to get home and they offered us $400 and then $800 and a hotel room to give up our seats. But nobody was willing to take it. Everybody had to get home.
That physician said he had to get home. He initially volunteered to give up his seat along with his wife, but when he was told the next flight wasn’t until (yesterday) he said, ‘I can’t be late. I’m a doctor.’
But they forced both to leave. I can’t believe what happened. It’s just a rare thing. You see stuff like this on the news, but you never think you’ll be there. It was a bizarre event.”
The doctor was told he and his wife were among the four bumped and he was pulled out screaming from his seat by police as Anspach and another passenger recorded it all on video. Anspach, who spoke to the Herald yesterday with his wife by his side, said his Twitter post has been shared 80,000 times at last count. But what people didn’t see is what still haunts him.
“The police officers were getting angry and this guy wouldn’t give up. He was bleeding after he hit his head and seemed dazed. Almost intoxicated after. He ran back in a second time and appeared as if he was sedated. Maybe it was because he hit his head while being removed. Medics gathered around him and helped stop the bleeding.
It doesn’t seem right to overbook a plane and then put it on passengers. I also don’t think the police reacted the right way. Things really escalated.
The main thing I take away is people aren’t able to calm down and do the right thing. We’re fundamentally flawed. It’s easy to point a finger at the cops or United, but we’re all inclined to mistrust and we are selfish.
We’re all too much like that cop who dragged that doctor off the plane. United needs to handle things a bit better.
On the way home we talked about what had just happened and then they turned the lights off and we went to sleep.”