Pax I dislike vol. 0.2

- Pax who request wheelchair service just to get priority treatment

Let me warn you; we have no tolerance for these type of passengers. I have no tolerance for these type of passengers.

If a pax has a disability and/or truly requires our assistance, we will go out of our way to make his/her trip as comfortable as possible. At our company, because we’re short staffed (a requirement in the airline industry it seems) more often than not, the check-in agent himself will fetch the wheelchair and wheel the pax not only to the boarding area but to the plane itself. If the flight is boarded by bus, the pax will be driven to the plane before the rest of the passage boards. He/she also gets the very first seat on the aircraft, not to mention, the pax jumps every single queue in the airport. He/she is the first through the security filters, passport controls, checking-in and boarding.

All this is very appealing to many people who request a wheelchair service while being fully capable of not only walking but skipping around the airport if they wanted to. It is not uncommon for a person requesting a wheelchair to pretend not to be able to move and then suddenly jump off the chair and run to greet their relatives a few meters away.

The other day for instance, I was wheeling a woman to the boarding area and as soon as we passed by the Duty Free shops, she had the audacity to tell me if I would be so kind as to follow her while she did her shopping and place her purchases on the wheelchair….. yeah right. I told her to carry the bags herself and wheeled the chair back to the storage room.

Again, I repeat, we have ZERO tolerance for these kind of passengers. We can be outright rude to you if you’re one of them. Our job is stressful. We’re always working against the clock. Every second is precious in an airline company and in the airport. Having to fetch a chair, then wheel the passenger to the boarding area (through every security filter), and down the lift if we’re boarding by bus takes a lot of time. We don’t have a lot of time.

If you really don’t need a wheelchair, don’t request it. Save yourself the embarrassment (and unpleasant flight). Remember that you are taking away a service someone else might truly need. We don’t have that many wheelchairs, staff, nor patience to wheel everyone around the airport!

Mr. Antonov

Let me introduce you to Mr. Antonov. Ruslan Antonov. Tony for his pals.

His measurements:
Length: 68.96 m (226 ft 3 in)
Wingspan: 73.3 m (240 ft 5 in)
Height: 20.78 m (68 ft 2 in)

In other words, HUGE.

Mr Antonov visited us the other day and only as the whale of the airline industry could, he left a long lasting impression. When he took to the tarmac all other aircrafts around him looked minuscule, like baby ducks frolicking around it’s mama. What a sight it was!

Ok so, Mr. Antonov was done with our airport and was ready to leave. We all awaited eagerly for the great exit, but we weren‘t expecting what was coming. Out of nowhere, a little shitty plane like this:

drove behind Mr. Antonov right when he started his engines. And then POOOF the little shitty plane was blown away to the other side of the tarmac like a paper plane. Poor little shitty plane was turned upside down by the strength of Mr. Antonov‘s mammoth engines . Even though none of the 2 pilots in it were greatly injured, it took the authorities 2 hours to turn it upright again.

Lesson learned? Don’t mess with Mr. Antonov or he won’t let you call him Tony.

We ain’t moving

Two co-workers and I finished the check-in for a flight to Italy early and were very pleased with ourselves. As we still had time before the boarding of the flight, we remained chit-chatting and gossiping for a few minutes before heading to the gate. Our little repartee was however suddenly interrupted by the voice of our flight bus driver through the walkie-talkie:

“Attention Boarding Italy Flight 123, the bus is full, can I leave to the plane?“.

My co-workers and I looked at each-other confused and when it finally hit us, all three dived at the walkie-talkie screaming “Nooooooo!! Negative! The flight isn’t boarded yet! You must have another flight’s passengers.”

We hurried to the boarding gate and our intuition was correct. Approximately 50 passengers were crammed into our bus, only they belonged to another airline company and they were heading to the UK.

We asked the passengers to please get off our bus but they refused. Not a single one of them moved. We tried pleading nicely then we threatened to call the police but it all fell to deaf ears. They refused to move until their own airline bus arrived. So we all had to wait for their bus and when it finally parked close by, all of them descended as if nothing had happened….