We all know and read (and some, write) the stories about the never-ending dramas that occur on airplanes. It kind of all started gaining a public eye last year with Dr. Dao and now it seems we hear of another incident that either goes viral or comes right up to such notoriety.
A Passenger Who Acted In a Way That Prevented Another Messy Airline Incident
This incident happened two weeks ago and I just saw it this week. I normally don’t write about the airline incidents that happen but I felt it was a nice balance to show an airline situation that had such a positive result.
The Story of a Mother, Her Two Small Children, and a Kind Stranger
We have incidents that are the fault of passengers and the fault of airline employees. Some of these incidents have included passengers with young children when the children are not behaving in a manner that is conducive for the plane to take off with everyone in their seats (is that diplomatic enough? :). As a father who has flown with young children, I totally understand how things can go wrong with them.
Whether it is a lack of sleep before the flight or maybe getting scared/nervous when someone is near them they don’t know or maybe they are just not acting good. Whatever the case, when a young child starts to cry or scream on an aircraft, trust me – no one is sweating more than the parent(s) that are with the child! 🙂
In some cases, those families have been removed from the airplane for a variety of given reasons and that never ends well! Well, here is the story of one passenger who acted with extreme kindness to help in a situation that could have ended like all those other stories.
You can read it from the Facebook feed below but to sum it up, a mother and her two children were boarding an American Airlines flight from Kansas City to Charlotte. Her two children, aged 4 months and 3 years old, both started having some issues at the same time – the baby because he was hungry and the 3 year old who, according to the mother, “lost her nerve” about the whole flying thing she had just been so excited about.
As it would happen, a man by the name of Todd Walker was seated near them. Instead of calling the flight attendants about the screaming child or putting on his noise-cancelling headphones for the flight, he helped with the children and eventually became seat buddies with the 3 year old. He helped her color, watched her movies with her and she was completely calm for the whole flight.
The pictures the mother posted are very cute and show the patience this man had to help the mother and children out.
And that was not all! They found out they were on the same connecting flight and Mr. Walker went up to the counter to ask to be seated next to them on the next flight! Now, the families have planned to get together and I have imagine the mother of those children was just so thankful for the kindness of Todd Walker that day.
Sure, he didn’t have to do that, but his kindness helped that little girl and her family out that day – and probably the rest of the plane as well! If that little girl had not been strapped in, we know from other airline stories that the airline flight attendants could have had them removed and that would have gotten messy. But, a little kindness helped it all out!
HT: Inc.com
LOVE THIS!
Wish more people would show a little more kindness and compassion.
It would help if trump and republicans, who run the country right now (and are running the country to the ground) set the example, like allowing people to keep their health insurance, keeping school kids safe from gun violence…pretty basic stuff.
Sorry, but when a society starts to blame their government for people’s lack of basic kindnesses, that is messed up. Yes, it is good for us to have good examples in our leaders but I am an adult and am not going to blame my actions on whomever is in power.
I recently flew Southwest w/whole my whole family. My teen and I had 2 seats together. A mum whose second language was English didn’t know about early family boarding for her infant and 3 year old. I kept trying to get her to go to the front of the line; she had a late C boarding number. Once she boarded, there wasn’t a single pair of seats available. The flight attendant asked for people to give up a pair of seats to her family. Nobody volunteered. The flight was late and delayed– Mom, toddler; and infant were exhausted. I volunteered my teenager’s and my seats. Everyone except my teenager loved me for it. The flight attendants gave me multiple free drinks, they wouldn’t let me use my credit card. When I told the attendants how my daughter was angry with me, they asked if she was old enough to give some drinks. (She’s 17). No boozing of the adolescent, but I ended up taking my teenager’s carpool shifts the next week to make it up to her. No good deed goes unpunished. 😉
That is a wonderful story! Good for you! I had one a couple of years ago where I was flying from Germany to the US in a bulkhead and a mom with her two small kids were trying to get seats together on a fully loaded flight. The woman that was near me was in a perfect position to give that seat but she had paid for that particular seat months before because it was best for her back. So, I told her she could have mine and that would let the mother and her little kids sit together. That meant I got a middle seat. 🙂 The flight attendants kept offering me free drinks (but I didn’t drink) and kept bringing me any food they possibly could during the flight!
Of course, like you said, no good deed goes unpunished. One of my new seatmates spilled his glass of wine on me and after I cleaned it up, the other person spilled their pasta on me. Great fun! 🙂
As a parent of young children I too have far more sympathy and tolerance for other children than before. However I disagree with your statement that all parents sweat or care when their children misbehave. I’ve seen a few parents completely ignore the rude behavior of young children or who appear to do nothing when their kids are bawling. Most, of course, do sweat…
You are absolutely correct – not all parents do that! In those cases, I do blame the parents. 🙂 I know that I sweat when my child is crying even a little!