Alaska Airlines

Alaska Airlines

June 6, 2005 I WILL NEVER FLY ALASKA AIRLINES AGAIN!

I am sending this letter to everyone I know, to all local newspapers and all Santa Clara Sporting Club teams and members. Sporting Club has a total of 28 youth teams and 2 adult teams. I will make sure they never use Alaska Airline again for tournaments or personal travel. Here is my story: On Thursday, June 2, 2005, my family and I went to Seattle for a soccer tournament with Santa Clara Sporting Club team. We arrived at the San Jose Airport at about 6:30 pm to get on the Alaska flight scheduled to leave at 8:30 pm that night. We learned from one of the Alaska clerks that the flight was delayed for about 3 hours. When we asked the clerk why the flight was late, she replied: “These flights are always late”. The flight left San Jose at about 10:30 pm. We had a very nice weekend. We received a second place toffee. On Sunday, June 5, we arrived at the Seattle Tacoma Airport at 4:00 pm to go to San Jose at 6:30pm. Again, the flight was late and we finally boarded at around 7:15 pm. Our

flight was 332 from Seattle Tacoma to San Jose. We travel to tournaments with the club at least twice a year and it is a family event. All players, directors and the coach bring their wives and kids. Most people were already seated and two of our players were playing with each other disputing who would sit in the middle seat. This all happened in a matter of seconds and one of the flight attendants approached the two players very rudely from behind. She yelled at one of the players while sticking her finger in his face: “You need to sit down right now!” He acted surprised by her reaction, but immediately sat down on his seat. She, on the other hand, continued to yell at him and putting her finger in his face. I mean, she was esthetical. The only thing he said to her in a very low voice is: “Please do not stick your finger on my face.” She shouted:” That is it!

He is out!” The other flight attendants reacted awkwardly, but did not say anything. The flight attendant went to the front of the plane while screaming: “He is out, he is out!”

After a few minutes another flight attendant came back to us and asked with an upset tone in her voice: “Does anyone else wants to go to San Jose? Or do you want to stay in Seattle?” She addressed herself to everyone in the plane that was sitting behind me. No one said a word. She looked at the player’s number seat and asked him loudly: Do you want to go to San Jose? He nodded yes. She said: Say it, say it! He said yes!!!! She walked back to the front of the plane. A few minutes later, the second lady came back and asked: Who is the coach? My husband told her that he was. She asked him to follow her to the front because the captain wanted to talk to him. My husband came back a few minutes later and told us that everything was OK.

He had explained to the captain what happened and the captain had agreed to depart. The captain told my husband that this flight attendant was not in tour flight. She was just helping with boarding because they were short staffed. She had just got in from another flight. We could tell from back where we were seating that this lady was esthetically arguing with the captain and they were not agreeing with something. So, we thought we were departing when all the sudden a man walks to the player telling him to get out of the airplane. Again the player got up, without saying a word and followed the man. We were so shocked!

After a little while I got up and walked up to the two flight attendants standing in front of the airplane and asked them why did he get out of the plane? What did he do? The same lady that yelled at the player, started to scream at me!! YOU ARE OUT TOO! THAT IS IT! OUT! OUT! I tried to explain to them that either the guy or I had done nothing wrong. Something was wrong with that lady. I was at this point trying to talk to the other flight attendant. I did not know what to do. I definitely did not expect that kind of treatment. Off course my husband and my two daughters followed me out of the plane. My daughters were crying, very scared and confused. Some members of our group got up as well walked to the front to find out what happened. At this point it was total confusion. There were two

security men at the door of the plane and they completely ignored the fact that we were trying to explain that we had done nothing wrong.

That this was a miss understanding because the flight attendant was yelling at us for no reason. I kept trying to tell the two security guards, I assumed they were security guards, but they did not have

uniforms. They did not give us the opportunity to talk. I was very upset, but tried to calm myself down and tell them to just listen to me. I did not do anything wrong! They refused to listen to me. I gave

up trying to explain what happened and went to the waiting room back in the airport. After a few minutes they called me back to the plan and we left. I was told that the captain told the man that we could go back to the plane. We did, but the player stayed. When we arrived at the San Jose airport there were police everywhere. They escorted us from the airplane to the car. I have never seen so many police in my entire life at once. My children were very scared again. I felt like a criminal. I did not say a word to the San Jose Police. I do not know what they were told. All I know is that I did not do anything wrong. I demand that this flight attendant is dismissed immediately. Her first name is “Bonnie”. She refused to give me her last name. To complete my story, I would like to mention that she made racist comments to me as I left the plane. She screamed: This always happen on this flight to San Jose! This Mexicans!” Sincerely, Tania

Santa Clara, CA 95050 Click this link to e-mail the message author: Email User