An impatient American Airlines passenger could not wait for his his turn to exit the aircraft and instead opened the emergency exit and walked off via the wing. But he didn’t get far…
Man Exits American Airlines 737MAX Via The Wing In Miami
The incident occurred on Wednesday on American Airlines flight 920. The flight was traveling from Cali, Colombia (CLO) to Miami (MIA) onboard a Boeing 737MAX. After reaching Gate D22, the man, 33-year-old Christian Segura, opened the over-wing emergency exit, hopped onto the wing, and walked off.
Video of the incident shows the emergency slide did not deploy, meaning the doors were disarmed already. It isn’t clear why Segura did not just wait a few more minutes to exit the aircraft via the jet bridge along with everyone else.
American Airlines passenger arrested at Miami Airport after opening emergency exit and climbing onto wing. https://t.co/X5AFK0ZQJApic.twitter.com/WkgNMsG2DW
— Breaking Aviation News & Videos (@aviationbrk) September 30, 2021
It’s not like he was trying to enter the country illegally – the man was a U.S. citizen. He did not get far: police arrested him promptly. He was first detained by U.S. Customs and Border Patrol and then transferred to the Miami-Dade Police Department.
An American Airlines spokesperson confirmed the incident:
During deplaning in Miami, a customer on American Airlines flight 920 with service from CLO to MIA exited the aircraft via an emergency exit. The customer was immediately detained by law enforcement. We thank our team members and law enforcement for their professionalism and quick action.
It is not clear if the man remains in custody or even charged with any crime. Per WPLG, he told police officers he was feeling ill and was later taken to an area hospital and treated for high blood pressure.
CONCLUSION
Segura is hardly the first man to try to exit an aircraft via the wing, but he demonstrates once again that impatience does not save you time. Another American Airlines incident in Miami…are you sensing a pattern here?
image: Twitter / WPLG
The 737s don’t have slides at the overwing exits, so that’s the reason one didn’t deploy. Makes it a lot easier for American to get the airplane going again – no slide to repack. On the bigger Boeings that have window exits, like most versions of the 757 and 767, the overwing slides are always armed. There’s no disarming mechanism from inside the a/c at the window, so if you open one of those, you will blow a slide. If you were to open one and the slide didn’t deploy, there’s a manual inflation handle inside the window frame.
At least he waited until the airplane came to a complete stop before hopping out onto the wing. Sometimes they don’t 🙂
Good to know! Thanks.
AA in Miami is basically a sub-meme of Florida Man at this point.
I only read the headline and thought: Miami? LOL!!!! What a place!!!
Because Florida.