By Dan Schlossberg
ConsumerAffairs.com
April 11, 2007
Cell phones and airplanes are a bad mix -- as one Northwest pilot learned the hard way.
His weekend flight was cancelled -- and his career possibly grounded -- after passengers overheard his obscenity-laced conversation on a cellphone and then became the victims of his venom after they complained.
After allegedly using the "F" word more than the mobsters on HBO's The Sopranos, the pilot was removed by Northwest officials and sent back to his Detroit base pending investigations by the airline and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
"He was having a fit," a female witness told Cable News Network. "He made a big disturbance."
The 180 passengers and five crew members on the flight from Las Vegas to Detroit were transferred to other flights and given both meals and hotel accommodations for the additional time they spent in Nevada.
The problem started when boarding passengers heard the pilot use obscene language while on his cell phone in the cockpit. His loud cursing continued after he barricaded himself into a lavatory behind a locked door, said FAA spokesman Ian Gregor.
When passengers asked him to tone it done, he directed his fury on them -- prompting a call to Las Vegas police.
The name of the veteran pilot was not made public.
Passengers who were on the cancelled flight received apologies from Northwest as well as reimbursement for their unexpected expenses.
