Frontier Airlines Passenger Arrested After Refusing to Deplane Over Exit Row Instructions
A Frontier Airlines passenger was arrested after refusing to deplane following an argument with flight attendants over exit row instructions, shocking footage shows.
The incident occurred at North Carolina’s Charlotte Douglas International Airport, causing everyone aboard the flight to deplane before takeoff. The chaos was filmed by a TikTok user and posted online earlier this month.
The footage begins with an unidentified woman engaged in a heated exchange with a flight attendant, at one point asking, “What is the problem?” She added, “We ain’t got no problem with that. We understand we gotta help people get off the plane.” The woman then told the flight attendant she was “wasting her breath” as the crew member walked away.
The video cuts to the woman, seated with two other passengers, verbally clashing with another flight crew member, apparently being asked to exit the plane. Over the public address system, the pilot can be heard apologizing for the delay and stating that the plane would take off once law enforcement arrived.
The footage then shows a third staffer, possibly from Frontier or the airport, also asking the woman to exit the plane, to no avail. The woman stated she was calling her lawyer and needed to reach her young grandson in Texas.
Another clip shows one of the pilots confronting the unruly passenger as other passengers encouraged her to deplane. “Are you arresting me?” she exclaimed. “What crime did I commit?” Passengers were then seen walking off the plane and back to the waiting area.
The woman was later spotted from the window being led off the plane in handcuffs, down a flight of stairs to the tarmac, and into a police vehicle. One man in the background called the woman a “dumba–.” Another woman commented on her shirt, saying, “And her shirt says God on it.”
A Charlotte Douglas International Airport representative referred The Post to Frontier Airlines. Frontier did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.
The TikTok user, Travel with Tia, who filmed the confrontation, explained in a follow-up video that when the woman realized she was in the exit row, she allegedly said she wasn’t going to “save anybody” and would worry about herself first. Passengers in emergency exit rows are asked by flight attendants before takeoff if they are willing and able to operate the exit door in case of an emergency.
“This may have been her first time in an exit row, so she did not understand or realize that the flight attendant has to get a verbal yes from everyone,” the TikTok user claimed. “She had an attitude with giving the verbal yes because she thought shaking her head was sufficient and didn’t realize why she had to give a verbal yes.”
The woman claimed several times during the footage that she had said yes as she argued with the flight crew.
