A Canadian man on an American Airlines flight from Milwaukee to Dallas-Fort Worth attempted to open a cabin door while in mid-air.
Dallas-Fort Worth Airport Department of Public Safety said the incident took place on American Airlines flight 1915 on Tuesday. The department responded to a report of a “disruptive passenger on board” and took one person into custody.
According to reporting from FOX 4 Dallas, a flight attendant told police that the man got up in the middle of the flight and told her he “needed to exit the plane immediately.”
He then began to get rowdier before rushing the 79-year-old attendant trying to reach the plane’s cabin door. Three fellow passengers helped the flight attendant and pinned down the man. Reports say the man’s legs and wrists were taped in order to restrain him.
The plane subsequently landed at Dallas-Fort Worth around 10 a.m. local time. The FBI Dallas Field Office told USA Today that its agents responded to the flight as well.
Reports say the flight attendant had her wrist and neck injured due to the altercation and had to be taken to the hospital but has since been released.
Passengers on the flight told WITI-TV in Milwaukee that others helped subdue the man.
“He says, ‘I’m getting off this plane, I gotta get off,’” Doug McCright said. “We’re 30,000 feet in the air, going 300-plus mph – nobody’s getting off this plane right now.”
McCright said a flight attendant signaled that she needed help. “The guy’s like 6-3, probably 6-4, so I was behind him then, and I grab him, pulled him back, so he couldn’t reach the handle on the door,” he said.
McCright said for a little more than a minute “it was just chaos.”
“I must have caught an elbow in the mouth there at one point in it,” he said, “but all you’re concerned about is, ‘You got to stop this. You have to stop this.’”
Charlie Boris also told WITI-TV that he saw the commotion and ran to help.
“The flight attendant that was heading back told that he was trying to open the door, and that’s when I kind of went all in,” he said. “Initially just saw a commotion and thought it was possibly medical or something, and pretty quickly realized that it wasn’t, and just ran up there. There was a gentleman that was being restrained and kind of fought with to get on the ground.
“It was kind of a fight-or-flight situation, and everyone just really helped and put together effort, and we all get to go to Thanksgiving.”
American Airlines said in a statement: “The safety and security of our customers and team members is our top priority and we thank our team members and customers for managing a difficult situation.”
USA Today and Claire Reid from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel contributed to this report.