A mother and daughter kicked off a Frontier Airlines flight after refusing to sit in a seat covered in vomit are suing the airline for $55 million for emotional distress.
Rosetta Swinney and her teenage daughter were flying from Las Vegas to Durham, North Carolina earlier this year after attending a wedding.
Upon boarding the flight at McCarran International Airport in Las Vegas, the two noticed somebody else’s vomit on their assigned seats.
According to the suit, the plane was already delayed to staff could clean the aircraft, as reported in WSOC-TV. Once the pair got on the plane, Swinney’s daughter reportedly got vomit on her hands while putting her bag in the overhead compartment.
When Swinney complained to a Frontier flight attendant, she was allegedly provided with gloves and bleach wipes to clean the mess up herself.
According to the lawsuit, Swinney refused which, led to her and her daughter being thrown off the flight.
The police were called on board and Swinney was removed from the aircraft and handcuffed. According to reports, the incident ended with Swinney in jail and her daughter in the care of social services.
In April, the time of the incident, Frontier Airlines released the following statement:
“During the boarding of flight 2066 from McCarran International Airport (LAS) to Raleigh-Durham International Airport (RDU) last week, two passengers told the flight attendants that vomit was present in their seat area.
“The flight attendants apologized and immediately invited the mother and her teenage daughter to move to either end of the plane so that the seat area could be cleaned. The mother and daughter were also told that once boarding was complete they would be provided other seats if available. The daughter was also offered cleaning products and invited to use the lavatory to wash up. The mother was unsatisfied with the response and became disruptive.
“As a result, the flight attendants determined that the mother and daughter should be deplaned and accommodated on another flight. The mother refused, and following procedure, law enforcement was called. Law enforcement then requested that everyone deplane so that the mother and daughter could be removed allowing the aircraft to be re-boarded and depart.
“We apologized to our passengers for the inconvenience caused by the departure delay. The safety of passengers and crew is our top priority at Frontier.”