A Florida man went on a racist tirade on a recent American Airlines flight, where he threatened to “take down this plane.” Video shows that the unruly passenger was physically removed from the airliner after ranting about “blue-eyed white devils” on the plane.
Shail Patel, 29, was onboard an American Airlines flight traveling on Tuesday from Tampa to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Court documents said Patel was intoxicated when he boarded the plane.
While the plane was still on the ground at the Tampa International Airport, Patel allegedly began “antagonizing passengers, calling flight attendants names, threatening passengers and aggressively moving through the aircraft.”
“I’m trying to get to my home country and you people made it harder for me to get to my home country,” Patel is seen yelling in the footage.
Court documents say Patel called American Airlines passengers “blue-eyed white devils” and threatened to “take this plane down with all you motherf***ers on it.”
WFLA reported, “Police said Patel slapped one passenger on the hand and face and spit on them.”
Video of the incident shows a fellow passenger attempting to escort Patel to the front of the plane, but then a physical altercation ensued. Patel got in the face of the passenger, and then he is shoved.
The passenger then put Patel in a headlock and forces him to the ground.
The passenger screams, “Put your hands down and don’t touch anybody!”
A flight attendant used the public announcement system to ask if there were any off-duty police officers who could assist in removing Patel from the plane. Police said there were six off-duty police officers on the flight.
Video shows other male passengers restraining Patel and escorting him off the plane.
American Airlines said in a statement: “Prior to departure of American Airlines flight 2506 with service from Tampa (TPA) to Philadelphia (PHL), law enforcement was requested to the aircraft due to a disturbance in the cabin involving a disruptive customer. We thank our team for their professionalism and apologize to our customers for the inconvenience.”
The flight was delayed by 30 minutes because of the unruly passenger.
Patel, from Tampa, was arrested and charged with two counts of battery and one count of disorderly intoxication.
Patel is being held at the Hillsborough County Jail on a $2,150 bond.
According to the Federal Aviation Administration, there have been 411 reports of unruly passengers in 2024. There were 2,075 unruly passengers last year. The FAA, which began keeping track of unruly passengers in 2017, said the most incidents happened in 2021, with 5,973 reports of unruly passengers.
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