Woman's airport meltdown over flight delay caught on camera

ByEyewitness News WABC logo
Wednesday, April 13, 2016
Woman has meltdown over flight delay
ABC's David Kerley has the story of a woman's caught-on-camera tantrum over a flight delay.

NEW YORK -- An airport meltdown was caught on camera, with an enraged mom lashing out because she said a flight delay was ruining her family's dream vacation, a delay that eventually closed in on 12 hours.

Angry passengers surrounded the counter late last month, waiting to fly from LaGuardia to Miami on American Airlines.

Police even arrived to help calm the crowd. But no one seemed as unhappy as one woman, who feared that she and her children were going to miss a long-planned Disney cruise.

"Don't give me this bleep anymore and you are going to pay for my Disney cruise and you are going to pay for everything else here," she said.

But LaGuardia on this night was shut down by strong winds.

The jet they were waiting for circled to the south, and was told to divert to Philadelphia.

"I am sitting here since 8 o'clock, with a nice year old who is waiting for her vacation and a thirteen year old and me," the woman screamed.

Finally the jet arrived, but the crew had worked so many hours that per union guidelines they couldn't fly to Miami so everyone had to wait until the morning.

Even a passenger advocate says you can't blame the airline.

"I hate to defend airlines as a consumer advocate all the time, but when they're got airline weather related problems, it messes up their entire system," said Travelers Unites Chairman Charlie Leocha.