An American Eagle flight was forced to divert in Colorado Springs to offload a passenger after a “service dog” attack onboard.
American Eagle Flight Diverts After “Service Dog” Attacks Passenger
On April 15, 2025, American flight AA4980 departed from Provo, Utah (PVU) bound for Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW). The flight was operated on behalf of American Eagle by a SkyWest CRJ-700 (registration code N767SK).
About an hour after takeoff, the plane made a sharp turn left and diverted to Colorado Springs (COS). The reason for the diversion? A dog attack onboard.
On the ground, the Colorado Springs Fire Department met the aircraft and transported one passenger to a local hospital. The condition of the passenger is not known.
After about an hour on the ground, AA4980 continued to DFW, landing at 5:05 pm (about 2.5 hours late).
US law requires airlines to allow service animals, limited to certain dog breeds, in passenger cabins at no cost. This includes so-called “psychiatric service animals” that can be self-certified.
> Read More: There’s A New Loophole To Allow Emotional Support Animals On Planes…
What Is The Long-Term Solution For Situations Like This?
Rather than be my usual divisive self today and just call for a blanket ban on dogs on airplanes (yeah, that’s still my position, but I’ve been a lot more pragmatic lately and am willing to compromise), what about requiring an insurance policy for dogs onboard to address potential attacks and holding dog owners criminally liable if their animals attacks, since that would demonstrate a willful misleading on the documentation attesting that the dog has been trained?
One Mile At A Time says that, “The whole reason we see this psychiatric service animal concept to begin with is because the lack of humane options that airlines provide for transporting dogs and other pets, as live animals really shouldn’t be put in the cargo hold,” but I am not clear on what basis he makes that reamks.
Are cargo holds also not pressurized and climate-controlled? We’ve certainly heard horror stories over the years about dogs dying in cargo holds, but that strikes me as sensational news coverage, just like coverage of air crashes. It is their rarity that makes them newsworthy. The US Department of Transportation puts the rate of animal deaths at 0.5 deaths per 10,000 animals transported…those are some darn good odds.
The issue, it seems to me, is finding a common-sense approach (including a potential liability waiver for airlines for any dog that has a pre-existing condition) that provides dogs with dignity in the cargo hold while minimizing risk in the cabin (from allergies and attacks) for human passengers.
CONCLUSION
A dog bite forced the diversion of an American Eagle flight and led to the hospitalization of one passenger, whose condition is not known. My thoughts go out to that passenger…I hope the injury is not life-threatening or handicapping.
Yesterday, I was on a flight where a young white woman in fancy workout clothes brought a big dog onboard with a small red service animal vest. It’s such a common occurrence now…the easy solution to travel with your dog across the country. I bring up her race, gender, and wardrobe because, at least anecdotally for me, it is invariably the same passenger type that takes large dogs onboard with service vests.
Without “throwing the baby out with the bathwater” for those who truly need service animals (and that is really not for me to say…), I’d say the solution is more liability for owners who choose to bring their dogs onboard, if they do not behave. Because dogs who have not been trained as “formal” service dogs and serve merely as psychiatric support animals pose a risk to others on the plane…an unacceptable risk.
Not gonna lie, I’ve seen two legitimate service dogs so far as a LH Hon and FB Ulti/Plat for life on all of my flights. The owner of the dog must be responsible for what happened and hopefully this makes airlines reconsider their service animal policies such that passengers show documentation.
Folks don’t have to go on vacation with a pet. There are a lot of pet sitters available.
if you really want to bring your pet, choose more accommodating transportation or place them in the cargo hold instead of abusing a system that is meant for people who have disabilities and require a service animal that went under rigorous training.
I strongly agree with Matthew.. all animals brought into the commercial aircraft cabin WOULD be required to have INSURANCE documentation (must be supplied, at a minimum, at least 24 hours in advance of the flight so that the
verification pressure is assumed at the reservations/corporate level and NOT assumed at the gate). This would thin things out CONSIDERABLY.
I like your idea, at least a great deal more than what we have now which is nothing. I still think requiring a licensed veterinarian to sign off on the service dog’s utility as a legit service animal would be a viable solution as well.
Wouldn’t a quick solution be to requrie all dogs to wear a muzzle while on the aircraft?
Yes, not a bad idea!
And a diaper
I hope the dog and the owner were taken off the plane with the diversion and had to drive to their destination..Animal travel Insurance sounds like a great new venture
So, abandon someone with a disability with possibly no way to get anywhere, some don’t drive, some have specific mechanisms in their vehicles at home and can’t just get a rental car, to figure it out? That’s not the answer. What about her motorized scooter, you can’t drop her off without getting it out of the cargo hold. Find her luggage too? My daughters service dog had to go through daily training for three years to be a mobility service dog. There are much better solutions then to take this out on legit service dogs and their handles. Yes, it’s horrible someone was bitten but from what I’ve seen, it’s not without being provoked. What happened that led to this? It would be so much better if there was a way to separate the imposter’s from the highly trained. Honestly the imposter’s do make it hard on my daughters service dog trying to do his job when another dog lunges at him. On the muzzles, if my daughter’s dog has one on then he can’t pick things up for her. Figure out who the imposter’s are and maybe muzzle them.
This is getting ridiculous how they are allowed to bring so called service dogs aboard people are just entitled when it comes to their dogs leave them at home we don’t want them around.
Basta!! Enough of this bullshit. A properly trained, TRUE service dog does not do this. A purse dog that you bought some “emotional support” or “service dog” vest off the internet is NOT a service dog. Businesses have to stop being such chicken shits about this, review the law, train their staff, get the FAA to step in (remember smoking used to be allowed until the FAA finally said no more). In the interim, the airlines should make anyone bringing a “service dog/ emotional support animal” on a flight sign the following liability: 1/ If my animal harms other passengers or crew, I am 100% responsible (make them demonstrate a liability insurance policy. I have to have one when I drive a car!) for all incidental and consequential damages, up to and including expenses born by the airline for cancel/ diverted / disrupted flight operations, passenger claims such as lost revenue for work, emotional harm, medical claims, etc. 2/ NO remote checking in…must see a check in agent, before clearing security. 3/ Liability risk will remain in place from check in to departure of final destination airport. I’m sure the lawyers in this group can write this better than I can, but I hope you get the point. Remember the days of traveling where you can buy an on-the-spot insurance policy in case your flight crashes? I can see leading travel insurance companies getting in on this action and selling policies as part of a ticket. This is not to apply to people with true SERVICE animals that are not certified by some website bullshit. To save the haters some time, I do recognize there is key place for ESAs but the standard for ESAs is nothing compared to a properly trained service animal and an aircraft is no place to not have distinctions made. Frankly speaking, I’m tired of going to my local Safeway and the management there ignoring State laws about what types of animals are allowed around food areas because they are too chicken shit to enforce the laws that are post on the freaking front door. Also, while I’m ranting ..sorry….I think the only way stores like Home Depot will stop this madness is when a child gets its face half bit off by somebody bringing their “emotional support” Doberman and the parents sue Home Depot.
@ marc
Agree fully. I am a physician and I have a true service dog used in my office.
The “therapy animal” moniker is misused, and the”emotional support animal” is a concept that is unsupportable.
Genuine service animals, such as guide dogs for the blind, or those who assist people with severe physical disabilities should not be clustered with the bizarreness I have witnessed. Patients ask me for a letter to get an animal certified as emotional support animals. They get a blank refusal unless I can observe the animal in question and test such things as tolerance of anxiety, triggered and untriggered aggression, impulse control etc.
To me, it carries some of the goofiness of someone declaring the animal is necessary for the person to be able to function.
I’ll never forget seeing a father bringing his kids and the kid’s pets aboard an aircraft to go to Grandma’s house for the summer. The animals were of course, the kid’s pets masquerading as “service animals.” As I looked at the parent, he had a smirky look on his face! I’m sure thinking….at least me or my wife don’t have to feed the dog. Grandma can do that.
If the animals are so so so so important for the family—-how could the family go to work or the kids go to school when they would have an emotional breakdown being away from the dogs, cats, lizards, hens, small pony, snake, hamster, birds, cock a too, turkey, lamb or sheep.
This is idiocy, gone to seed.
So was the dog destroyed? That is the bare minimum.
I only want trained service animals for disabled people on planes.
Do you mean you can just walk any dog onto a flight and call it a service dog? I thought it was strictly regulated so a service dog is really what the owner claims it to be. I thought you have to have a certificate, insurance &c. And it’s not only passengers; what if a so called service dog attacks a member of the crew?
I can’t disagree more with Matthew. A blanket ban on dogs in cabins is perfectly acceptable. This insanity is getting me to the point where I start to lose sympathy for even seeing eye dogs with so many fakers.
Also it’s really, really suspicious that this incident which local news covered and reported that the incident involved a 10 year old boy having his genitals mauled by this beast didn’t get wider coverage.