Gokhan Mutlu of Manhattan is suing JetBlue Airways for $2 million because a pilot made him sit on the toilet for 3 hours!
Mutlu was traveling on a a "buddy pass," a standby travel voucher that JetBlue employees give to friends, from New York to San Diego on Feb. 16, and returned to New York on Feb. 23, the lawsuit said.
Initially, Mutlu was told a flight attendant had taken the last seat on the plane, but then he was advised she would sit in the employee "jump seat," meaning he could have the last seat, the lawsuit said.
The pilot told him 1½ hours into the five-hour flight that he would have to relinquish the seat to the flight attendant, court papers say. But the pilot said that Mutlu could not sit in the jump seat because only JetBlue employees were permitted to sit there, the lawsuit said.
When Mutlu expressed reluctance to go sit in the bathroom, the pilot, who was not named in the lawsuit, told him that "he was the pilot, that this was his plane, under his command that (Mutlu) should be grateful for being on board," the lawsuit said.
When the aircraft hit turbulence and passengers were directed to return to their seats, but "the plaintiff had no seat to return to, sitting on a toilet stool with no seat belts," court papers say.
I do have to admit though, 2 million bucks is a lot of money for someone flying gratis and, like Sid said, suffered no real monetary damages. And his emotional damage could be easily repaired with a free ticket to whatever his eventual destination is - maybe even in first class, since I totally understand that it must have sucked for him to be in the bathroom like that.
I have to agree with Mary F, too. If there wasn't room on the plane for this guy, they should have decided that before they took off.. not after!
This isn't about whether this guy was hurt emotionally or physically, but is about punishing an airline for treating its passengers like cargo.
I'm not one to promote frivolous law suits, but this is just outlandish.
http://dlisted.com/node/25889
This guy should be very grateful to fly for free! If one wants to have everything included, he has to spend some money on it.
Complete fool :)
People need to stop whining, and expecting companies dish out millions because of their "emotional suffering".
Someone should show him what real suffering and endangerment is.
If you went to the police about someone hitting your car, would you expect them to respond, "well did you get thrown from your windshield into oncoming traffic where you lost your legs? No? Not worth our time."
Sometimes you have to make a lot of noise to get something done. Also, I don't think Jet Blue was that nice to start with.