A 54-year-old man was arrested and faces several criminal charges for rioting and assault on a flight from Cuba that landed at John C. Munro Hamilton International Airport in Ontario, Canada, on Thursday afternoon.
The Air Transat flight arrived shortly after 3 pm from Cayo Coco, Cuba, and when the passenger got off the plane, Hamilton police were waiting for him, the outlet reported. Toronto Star.
Agent Krista-Lee Ernst apparently said the subject, whose nationality is unknown, had drunk too much alcohol, which would have been a key factor in the incident, which left several people injured although none had to be taken to the hospital.
The incident began when the passenger wanted to smoke and began threatening the flight staff, causing a “disruptive and unsafe environment,” Ernst said.
Several passengers intervened to try to help the flight staff control the “unruly” passenger.
Police were alerted about half an hour before the plane landed, allowing authorities to quickly arrest the man in what police described as a “highly unusual incident” in Hamilton.
Bernard Cote, an Air Transat spokesman, said: “The man was restrained by our crew and passengers, and was arrested upon landing.” “The incident did not cause any delays,” he stressed.
According to the International Air Transport Association (IATA), the rate of incidents on board aircraft increased from one every 835 flights in 2021 to one every 568 flights in 2022.
The association noted that this includes violence against flight crews and other passengersharassment, verbal abuse, smoking and not following safety protocols.
Although only a small minority of passengers cause such problems, IATA noted that they have a “disproportionate impact.”
It was recently reported that a woman from Philadelphia, United States, could pass Up to 21 years in prison after pulling down his pants in the aisle of a plane to urinate, assault a flight attendant, and threaten to kill passengers while aboard a Frontier Airlines aircraft.
The event occurred on November 20, 2023 on Frontier Airlines flight 4944 from Orlando, Florida, to Philadelphia International Airport. The accused had also been drinking and pulled down her pants in front of several children, to urinate in the aisle of the plane, which at that time was doing landing maneuvers.
