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WEST PALM BEACH, FLA. (March 17, 2002)
--Since there are at least two sides to every story, we hope Delta Air Lines has a good explanation for turning a well-deserved Spring Break for six college seniors into a tearful nightmare.
It was Delta Flight No. 373 from Atlanta to Washington Reagan National. The St. Paddy's Day morning had started before dawn at Palm Beach International Airport with the change in Atlanta. The six present and former roommates are all seniors at American University. Full disclosure forces me to reveal that one of this six young women is my daughter, who I have learned to believe and trust.
The crowded flight had the six divided three and three in different rows with a young man in the row between them. There is no polite way to be politically incorrect, so I'll come right out with it: he had a swarthy complexion, looked stereotypically Arab, and seemed jumpy and nervous from the git-go.
Several passengers mentioned his quirky behavior to the flight attendants at the start of the flight and they thanked the passengers and comforted people not to worry. Three good looking, athletic, and probably eager-to-please-any-coed passengers told other passengers, "Don't worry, if anything happens we'll jump into action."
About an hour before arrival in Washington, the restrictions which have been in place to and from New York, Washington, and some other cities with tall buildings went into effect. No standing, no walking, no restrooms, no exceptions.
On a flight to New York a few months ago a flight attendant joked to a passenger to "just hold it in, or pee in your pants."
A half hour from D.C., the young man in question gets up and quickly goes to the restroom. The girls alerted the flight attendants.
For the record:
My daughter interned for a semester last year in London in a sensitive political office, and last semester worked on the same floor as Sen. Tom Daschle's anthrax-laden office, forced to go through the Cipro regimen; another young woman is a star NCAA Div. I basketball player from Western Massachusetts, destined for European stardom next year; another worked in the office of British Prime Minister Tony Blair; two others studied in Madrid and will continue studies in international business and finance. They were from the Washington area, Southern California, Florida, and New Hampshire, and Massachussetts. Frankly, the best and the brightest.
The crew did nothing.
"What do you expect US to do?" one flight attendant told a tearful student.
Apparently the young college men and other passengers were told to stay put and do nothing.
Eventually the many who had broken the rules returned to his seat.
When the incident was reported to security guards and Delta personnel upon landing, the young man was not detained, nor was his baggage searched.
Keep in mind, these Washington students lived through the Pentagon massacre; had classmates and professors lose loved ones; evacuated the Hart Senate Office Building and other D.C. venues wracked by bomb and anthrax scares, and live and study with the highest concentration of foreign students in the nation.
Their spring break trip on a budget to Key West, South Beach, but mostly our den, living room, and spare bedroom, has a well-deserved break from the pressure before graduation in May.
My daughter reports that one of her friends, whose family had relocated from Rochester, NY to Washington, was still sobbing in fear after arriving at the terminal.
"He probably was an air Marshall," I reassured my daughter, "that's why the flight crew was not concerned about it."
As only a daughter can remonstrate her father, the response came back over the phone, "Da-aaaad. Puhleaaase! He wasn't an air Marshall, and no air Marshall is going to flaunt regulations in front of the public by getting up and violating the restricted air space rules."
Since flights resumed after 9-11 I've flown to New York, Washington, Texas twice, California, and Panama. On every section of every flight, the staff and crew have taken each scintilla of security in deadly serious fashion.
A few hours later, with the girls safely back in their university-owned apartment (under the watchful electronic eyes of the Russian Embassy across the street), I asked my daughter one final time, what Delta's response was to the incident upon landing.
"Don't worry, we'll check into it," she was told. ---
Former UPI newsman Mark Scheinbaum is a regular contributor; heard daily to 200 cities on Doug Stephan's "Good Day" radio program, and chief investment strategiest for Kaplan & Co., BSE, NASD, SIPC.
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