Frontier Airlines Flight Suspended After Passenger Fights Attendant, Opens Emergency Door

A Frontier Airlines flight from Cancun, Mexico, to St. Louis, Missouri, was cancelled Monday due to an onboard disturbance by a passenger who was also escorted from the plane.

Authorities said the passenger tried to get off the flight while it was taxing to the runway.

A Frontier Airlines spokesperson told KTVI that the passenger got agitated and complained he was ill when the flight was about to take off. This forced the pilot to return the plane to the gate.

The passenger then became physically violent with a flight attendant and opened a cabin door, which led to the emergency slide being automatically deployed. He then tried to exit the plane. Co-passengers and flight attendants managed to stop him until Mexican police arrived.

Kathleen Ingham, a co-passenger, said the situation was very frightening and disturbing. She recorded a part of the incident on her cell phone which showed the man struggle with crew members and passengers.

Other videos of the incident showed the passenger and his father speaking with Mexican officials outside the flight. The man was then taken to a hospital for medical evaluation, and he remains in a Mexico hospital.

His mother claimed her son was on vacation with his father, and was attacked inside a Cancun hotel and hit on the head the night before the incident. She also thinks his drink may have been spiked.

The airlines removed the flight from service. The passengers were rebooked on other flights and also provided with hotel accommodations.

The name of the passenger was not revealed and Mexican authorities were investigating the incident.

In a similar incident in September, a passenger tried to open the exit gate, apparently mistaking it for the washroom door. The incident occurred on a GoAir flight from New Delhi to the Indian city of Patna.

Some passengers shouted after they saw the man get up from his seat, walk toward the rear end and try to open the exit door. Flight attendants rushed toward him and managed to restrain him with the help of other passengers after a bit of wrestling.

The passenger was kept under watch throughout the journey and handed over to police after landing. During questioning, the man said this was the first time he was travelling in a flight and he mistook the exit door for that of a washroom.

“People asked him why he was doing so (trying to open the exit gate). He told them that he needed to use the washroom urgently and kept tugging at the exit door. Pandemonium prevailed amid all this and he was restrained and finally handed over to us. He said that the confusion happened because he had boarded a flight for the first time in his life,” Airport Police Station House Officer Mohammad Sanowar Khan said.

The man was released on personal bond after police verified his claims.