Ryanair sues a passenger - should they?
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I want to talk about Ryanair. So you might have heard this news that they are suing. They've announced they're going to sue a former passenger after the behaviour of that passenger forced a flight from Dublin to Lanzarote to divert and stop in Porto, in Portugal. Dara Brady is Director of Marketing and

and Communications at Ryanair and he spoke to the gang on Newstalk Breakfast this morning. He explained why they are making this move. I,

I guess this move is really just reinforcing our zero tolerance policy for passengers that cause disruption on flight. We've always taken a very strong view that, you know, passengers, the majority of passengers that are travelling, you know, never cause any trouble. And we think we can't have passengers and families travelling with us being disrupted by,

the behaviour of certain individuals on flights. And we've taken a very strong view that we will do whatever we can to ensure that we send a very strong message that disruptive behaviour on board our flights won't be tolerated. That's Dara Brady from Ryanair explaining why they're looking for €15,000 through the courts from this passenger. Pádraig O'Kage, the founder of Air Ireland and Aer Lingus Regional. Pádraig, are Ryanair right to do this, do you think?

Hi, good afternoon, Ciarán. I think they're 100% right. I'd back them all the way on it. I think it's a very, very important, let's call it kind of a priesthood to set, even though it's not really a priesthood because this has happened before in the past. But there are

Two fundamental reasons why I actually strongly support this, Ciarán. Number one is it's everybody, every employer's responsibility to help and support the staff so the staff can work in the most, I suppose, proper professional environment that they properly can. And quite frankly, it's the staff who are the number one, the brunt of issues when these kind of things happen. And secondly, and very importantly also, this could be a safety factor.

And number one for any airline, if you ask, I don't care, Michael O'Leary or anybody, you ask them what's the single most important word in your business, I can guarantee you those who really understand who work in aviation will tell you the number one word is safety.

And you cannot and will not compromise on that. So I believe what Dara is saying and what Ryanair are saying, I support them 100%. All right. Well, listen, stay with us, Pari, because I want to ask you about a few aspects of that. But to get a sense of the impact all of this has on airlines and their crew, Marisa McAuliffe is with us. She's a former air hostess and the author of Convessions of an Air Hostess. Marisa, you're welcome to the show. Marisa.

unruly passengers or passengers whose behaviour is so bad a plane has to be diverted. Tell me what that was like, what that experience was like from somebody working on the flight. Well, it's absolutely terrifying because you can imagine there's nowhere to run, there's nowhere to go if you're a passenger or you're a crew member. I mean, it's not like you can open the door and shove them out. So when somebody kicks off on...

and you're in a confined space, it's much worse than if they did it in like in a restaurant or in a shopping centre or even in a park where you can call 999 or you can, there's security. I mean, you really are a sitting duck, you know, when somebody goes crazy like that. And,

It is terrifying, it is. I mean, I experienced this. I experienced a passenger trying to strangle another passenger and luckily that there were a few men on board that were able to restrain him until we landed. We had to divert to Shannon and he ended up going straight to court and he got three months jail. But like...

Like, I was in my 20s, you know, and this guy was, you know, three times my weight, twice, you know, as big as me. There was absolutely no way I could have used the handcuffs on him, you know, because he was just so intimidating. And I was very frightened. You know, I know I went to counselling after that, the airline sorted it out.

as they usually do, something traumatic like that happens. But, you know, for the passengers coming over to Ireland for the first time, so excited coming from New York. I mean, that was a rotten start to their holiday. So, I mean, you do need to go after these people. It is not acceptable to...

to disturb everybody on the flight. And Marisa, in your experience, when it happens, is it most often, is it drink-fuelled? Is it drugs? What is it? It's usually drugs. It is usually drugs. Yeah, because I mean... Drugs taken on the flight or before they get on the flight? Well, sometimes I would say usually before the flight because I think it would be more difficult to get needles through. But I mean, we did...

regularly find needles in the toilet. You did not, really? Yeah, regularly in bins. I mean, in training we were told never to put your hands into the seat back pocket without gloves.

because of needles. Sorry, I assume maybe they'd be using them in the toilets, in the actual seat back, so people could use them in their seat or dispose of them there anyway. Yeah, it might have been flights to Ibiza. I mean, it wouldn't be your regular London flights. No, but still. Yeah, but still, I mean, there were certain types of flights that you would just... I put on my oven gloves when I was checking, doing the security check.

But often it is drink. But the thing about somebody drunk, you can usually tell that they're drunk. But with drugs, I mean, you just don't know. You don't know. And they can come on, they can be on prescription medicine and one drink.

we'll send somebody off, you know, and I've witnessed this. I've witnessed people trying to open the plane door or they want to go into the cockpit and talk to the captain. They want to land. It is really, really terrifying because you...

All you can do is wait. And sometimes that's two hours, three, four hours. You know, if you're coming back from L.A., that's a very long flight to. And it's not fair on the other passengers. It's not fair. It's not fair on anybody. So what about the idea of limiting drink in the airport? I mean, obviously, if somebody is shooting up or taking other drugs on the plane, that doesn't help. But is there is there merit in it?

No, not at all. Not at all. I mean, the airport is huge. I mean, you just go from bar to bar, from restaurant to restaurant. You bring, drink on the way. The 12 pubs of the airport.

Yeah, there's absolutely no... I mean, I regularly see people, you know, at six in the morning, they're there with a pint at the pub. But I mean, who's going to follow them around when they go from bar to bar? Nobody. It is absolutely not... You cannot control grown adults at an airport by following them around. Also, it's not a crime to drink. You cannot, like...

bringing these sanctions into airports. You know, you could do it on flights. You could definitely say maximum. But we need somebody to take the lead. So maybe Michael O'Leary could be the person to start. I think it's a good idea to limit drinks on board. But the thing is, selling drinks is very profitable for airlines. So, I mean, I just can't see that happening. Also,

A lot of people are able to have three or four drinks and they're fine. So people have to take responsibility for their own actions. So if they can't take a drink or they can't behave with one or two drinks, then the onus is on them to behave. Pádraig O'Kage is still with us. Pádraig, do you think that kind of the, well, the partial solution to this, no perfect solution to human behaviour, but I mean, the partial solution is a limit on drink or is it something else?

Well, first of all, Ciarán, I'd say that I have flown hundreds, if not thousands of flights in my day and 99.99% of people are absolutely 100% supportive of the cabin crew and anybody. But all you need is one person on the odd flight can cause serious, serious trouble. So we're talking about the exception here and not the rule.

Having said that, I do believe that airlines need to take a little bit more responsibility. Like, for example, I don't think that alcohol should be sold on board an airplane, quite frankly, particularly on reasonably short haul flights. But I don't think it should be sold on airplanes in any event. Cigarettes aren't sold on airplanes and there are terms and conditions. So no glass of wine on a transatlantic flight? I suppose.

I suppose between myself... It's a very middle class complaint I've just made, I realise. I know, I wouldn't be a big... I genuinely wouldn't be a big supporter of it. I think somebody can sit down for five, six hours or even seven hours without having a glass of wine. So I do. But that's just me. But I... Ciarán, I don't know. Like, jeez, the Kilkenny lads aren't big into drinking wine either. So I think...

I think we're okay on that. We usually have a match that we're getting ready for. But listen, if... We'll talk about the match another day. But back to Marissa's point. That's the drink thing maybe then. Limit it certainly on the plane. Don't set it on the plane. But what about just behaviour in general? Should there be maybe a...

kind of a more severe approach to it, to misbehaviour? 100%. But the Irish Aviation Authority, who work under, I suppose, the guidance of EASA, the European Aviation Safety Agency, they have got pretty straightforward guidelines. Marisa mentioned there about crew training. That's number one. Cabin and flight crew are trained to recognise and de-escalate disruptive behaviour. The second thing is they're obliged to report it.

such as threats and violence and so on and so forth. And then it moves on from there for potential penalties. So it could be a criminal and or a civil offence. Like I mentioned to your researcher earlier today when we had a brief chat, I remember back in the days in Aer Lingus Regional and we had a flight, I think it was to Cork, and there was quite a disruptive passengers and the captain crew couldn't deal with them. And they called the captain, captain came down, asked him to be quiet, what did he do? Closed his fist and he broke the captain's nose.

And what happened there was there was the guards were brought, guards came on board, took the person off. And there was a criminal action against, we didn't follow up on a civil action, but there was a criminal action against the particular passenger at that time. Now, that's quite a long time ago. The other thing, though, that's, I think, important, Ciarán, here, is that the...

This is not the first time that an airline has brought a civil action against a passenger because of significant extra cost in having to move to a different airport, for example, and also to overnight and all of that type of thing. All of those passengers...

lost a night and a day of their holiday through no fault of their own, through no fault of the airline. The airline had to pay for the accommodation, had to reroute, and between us and anybody who's listening, quite frankly, €15,000.

is a small amount of money in relation to, I believe, what the real cost to Ryanair was. Yeah, I assumed, I actually assumed it would be an awful lot more than that. Big time. Given what I heard. It probably was in reality, but this is what they've pursued. I'm sure there's kind of a legal reason maybe they've limited it to that in terms of the court action. Why not make it very clear that there would be a total...

ban if somebody misbehaves in a flight or has a problem on a flight that will be banned or a lifelong ban from that airline says one listener there's Gardaí in the airport so if gate staff believe someone has drank too much have them breathalysed they need to update their terms and conditions with the maximum alcohol blood level to be allowed

to get on a flight. And let's be honest, it's not that long ago that cigarettes were banned from planes and that probably seemed like a massive ask at the time. I don't see why alcohol shouldn't be dealt with the same way. No one needs a drink to be able to fly, says another listener. Paire Cocaja, who's the founder of Air Ireland and Aer Lingus Regional, thank you very much. And Marisa Mackel, former air hostess and author of Confessions of an Air Hostess and more stories like that she shared with us. Marisa, thank you for speaking to us as well.

The Hard Shoulder with Kieran Cudahy. With the MG Hybrid and Electric range. Weekdays from 4 on Newstalk.