The correct solution in this case is that if an airline decides that they want to reclaim 4 seats that were sold to customers, that they figure out a way to get 4 people to voluntarily give up their seats. This was not the last plane out of Saigon. Likely a very small percentage of the flight would not leave the plane for any amount of money (family emergency, etc) and the rest would happily give up their seat for some amount of money. One person on that flight said they would give up their seat for $1500 and the employees laughed at him. For example, I imagine if they offered $10,000 that the vast majority of the plane would have raised their hands. Delta has increased their max offers to about that amount and I assume United will do the same.
>""We're very sorry, but due to scheduling conflicts caused by a disruptive passenger,
So someone who paid for something and doesn't want it taken away is now considered "disruptive"? If a landlord signs a lease with a tenant he can't just decide to kick the person out and use violence agains the "disruptive" tenant who wants the landlord to live up their side of the contract. The airline contract of carriage specifies reasons why someone might be denied transport, but wanting to reclaim your seat for use by their employee is not one of them.
The passenger is not actually disruptive in the traditional sense, but is disruptive to the way the airline wants to run itself. The passenger has no access to the announcement system to rebut the assertion, so the airline can paint them in as bad a light as they like.
Or did you think that airline employees did not routinely lie to passengers for their own convenience?
And flight plans can not only be changed and refiled on the ground, they can be altered in the air by talking to a control tower over the radio.
One cannot serve two masters. You cannot serve the public interest as police and a private interest as a security thug at the same time.
Following orders takes no guts. It takes guts to refuse to obey an unlawful order. The Nuremberg Principle still exists.
Planes aren't trains, either. They can fly on any heading, with speed and distance dependent only on fuel supply.
"We're very sorry, but due to scheduling conflicts caused by a disruptive passenger, this aircraft will now be departing for Fargo, North Dakota, instead of Louisville, Kentucky, with earliest possible takeoff slot in six hours. Please deplane and form a line at the gate agent's desk to arrange for alternate transportation, or stay on this plane as it is pushed back from the gate for six hours, with no airflow, locked bathrooms, and no easy way to return to the terminal, and then go to Fargo, where you will get no compensation from the airline, nor any assistance getting to any other destination."
I'd get off "voluntarily". If that's the bluff, I definitely wouldn't want to call it. After I get off, the pilot says, "Psych!" and the original flight to Louisville is back on, and everyone at the gate gets back on the plane without me. If any cop was called at all, he gives me a complimentary cart ride back outside the secured area, and talks the whole way about that one time Sheriff Andy let him put his bullet in.
A plane doesn't have to take off on time. It doesn't have to take off at all. Once the airline decides it isn't taking off with you on the plane, you're just not going to be seeing any cloud tops from where you're currently sitting. At that point, it's only a matter of what it's going to cost to make you leave. And you have to rely on the company's assessment of what would be the cheapest way to do that. Hopefully, the rule of law is strong enough that "beat him up" is costlier than idling a whole plane on the tarmac for a few hours.