PLANE SILLY: Ryanair aircraft diverted due to unruly customer on Malaga flight

RYANAIR, airline leader in passenger transport numbers by flight in Malaga, reported an incident on a flight involving a passenger travelling to Dusseldorf from Malaga yesterday (Monday).

As reported by the company, the flight had to be diverted towards the airport of Santander due to the disruptive behaviour of the man during the flight. 

No further details were provided by the airline regarding the event.

The plane landed normally and the police arrested the alleged suspect before the flight took off again for Dusseldorf. “At no time will we tolerate inappropriate or conflicting behaviour, the safety and comfort of our passengers, crew and plane are our top priority, this matter is now in the hands of the local police”, Ryanair.

The State Agency for Air Safety have forwarded that involvement in threatening the safety of passengers and crew can cost up to €5,000 in fines. The number of problem passengers at Spanish airports was 441 in 2016 and 538 in 2017. Last year alone, the AESA (Spain’s air safety agency) has fined 326 people, for a total amount of €221,325.

By nationality, the United Kingdom has the highest number of sanctioned passengers, 196, followed by Spain with 53, Germany with 19, Ireland with 15, France with 11, Poland with 9, Belgium and Romania with 3, the Netherlands, Sweden and Switzerland with 2 and Finland, Greece, Norway and Russia with 1.

The agency is collaborating with the authorities of other countries and participates in the working group of “disruptive passengers” of the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), to identify and develop new strategies that can minimise the frequency of these occurrences.