In spring 2023, Air New Zealand (ANZFF) caused a stir in the aviation industry after announcing that it would launch an “International Passenger Weight Survey” in which passengers boarding certain long-haul flights would be asked to step on a scale when checking in. check-in.
While the experiment was requested by the country's Civil Aviation Authority (the scale result was not shared with the check-in agent and was included in an anonymous data pool intended to provide the airline with information on the plane's total weight ), Air New Zealand recently became embroiled in a weight-related scandal again after two passengers claimed they were removed from a flight for being “too big.”
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The incident occurred on a short domestic flight from Napier, in the eastern part of New Zealand's North Island, to the capital of Auckland, further north-west, on Friday, March 15.
WILLIAM WEST/AFP via Getty Images
Passenger describes: “I just couldn't believe what was happening to me”
Angel Harding, a Maori woman returning home from a Hui (Maori term for an informal gathering of indigenous people), told meLocal news outlet 1News reported that she and a friend had initially boarded a plane that was ordered to turn around during filming.
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All passengers had to get off, but Harding and her traveling companion were not allowed to reboard due to what she claimed was their size.
“I was shocked and walked forward, and she started yelling at me that the pilot can't take off unless all the armrests were down, and she was pretty aggressive with me,” Harding said of her interaction with the flight attendant as the plane turned. lap. “She was talking to me aggressively. She just couldn't believe what was happening to me.”
Harding further described that the flight attendant hit the armrest in a way that hurt her left arm after approaching and beginning to scold her and her friend for sitting incorrectly.
“She said, 'Don't you think you should be sitting if the plane is moving?'” Harding described. “And then (the flight attendant) looked at both of us and said, 'I can get you both kicked off this flight.'” She also said the flight attendant repeatedly told them they should have bought “two seats each.”
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After being dropped off at the gate, the two women were reportedly told to reserve two seats each on the same flight, the earliest availability of which was nearly 48 hours later, on Sunday.
After Harding and his friend said they couldn't afford this kind of expense, the airline eventually covered their return tickets, put them up in accommodations and gave them lounge access while it worked to figure out where communication broke down. But Harding said he was still told this was an exception and that he would need to book more than one seat if he wanted to fly with Air New Zealand in the future.
Another traveler who was on the same flight said she saw “both of them crying” with embarrassment as the plane pulled away and felt incredibly “sad to leave them behind.”
New Zealand could not immediately be reached for comment on the situation.
