Rapper Flavor Flav unloaded on a gate agent in Las Vegas after narrowly missing his Spirit Airlines flight. Did he have a point?
Flavor Flav Captured On Video Cursing Out A Spirit Airlines Gate Agent In Las Vegas
William Drayton, Jr., the rapper known as Flavor Flav, now 63 years of age, was sitting in the gate area of Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas (LAS) waiting to catch his flight to Detroit (DTW) on Thursday night.
He was on his laptop and on the phone and missed the boarding announcement. When he noticed the gate agent shutting the door, he scampered over but was told he was too late. When the gate agent refused to reopen the gate, he exploded in rage.
(Another report suggests he deliberately waited to board to avoid having to take pictures with his fans onboard, which would have slowed down the boarding process and potentially led to a flight delay).
In a statement to TMZ, the rapper apologized for his outburst:
“Spirit Airlines shut the door on me while I was in line to board. I was upset and said some harsh words to the gate agent. I apologize to those who witnessed me acting out of character. I do not apologize to Spirit Airlines or the gate agent.”
His predicament is an important reminder that being in the gate area is not enough: we must keep an eye on the boarding process and not space out.
I can empathize with Flavor Flav. While I have not missed a flight, one time I was so engrossed in my work at LAS that I lost track of time and nearly missed my flight. While I did make the flight, I left my digital camera in the gate area and never recovered it.
CONCLUSION
Celebrities make headlines, but missing a flight by being preoccupied is a very common occurrence. Avoid this by paying attention when boarding commences and not waiting too long in the process to board the flight. These days, with overhead bins so full, it generally pays to board early anyway to avoid having to check baggage. Then again, this does not seem to be a problem on Spirit Airlines, which charges more for the use of overhead bins than it does to check bags…
(image: Spirit Airlines // H/T: View From The Wing)
#freeflavorflavyo!
Wasn’t this guy that wore a giant clock on a neck chain? Guess it didn’t have an alarm
That’s great, so much better than Jerry’s material!
My hero. Miss the show
Maryland beat me to the punch! I wanted to make a clock joke.
Flav does have a habit of flying low-cost. I was once on an LAX -LAS flight with him on WN a number of years ago. Guess this is why he hasn’t gone broke like so many other music stars.
Flavor Flav has been one of my favorite rappers growing up and I was able to meet him twice in my life- once at a McDonald’s and once at the airport. Both times, he was chill and humble, so I’m not surprised by this.
…..or he’s almost broke.
He was going to Detroit to be on the sidelines at the University of Michigan football game. Presumably they would have covered the tab for the flight. Not sure why the university wouldn’t pony up for a flight on delta.
Flav has 7 (cancel that, 8) children from about as many different women. Do the math on how much CS that is…
No need to act like a Public Enemy.
I understand how that can happen. One of my pet peeves is that in so many airports, you can be in the gate area and either miss or not be able to understand the gate announcements. The sound system is so bad it just sounds like “mernobodmitegrooplayneshortlysomthingsomething” even when you are only 25 feet away. Half the time you can’t tell what group number they called. And sometimes you can hear the announcements from two gates over clearer than you can from the gate you are next to. Flying takes attention – the airlines don’t make it easy.
The installation and maintenance of airport PA systems are the responsibility of the airPORTS, not airLINES…I suspect Mr Drayton maybe overestimates,too,his(fading ) popularity
A lot of the “distortion” (I imagine) comes from weary gate employees who simply mumble at times. And I tip my hat to the ones who bypass the public address and just yell! Loud & clear and we’re out of here
It sounds like the larger issue was that he and 2-3 other customers were denied boarding after lining up, presumably because the flight was oversold and there were no more remaining seats (they apparently gave his and the others away to other overbooked passengers) but not sure how that worked in his case as he either paid for an assignment (I would assume he would book Big Front Seat class) or left it to chance and took an assigned seat with check-in — I assume he did check in but they then reassigned his (and a few others’) seats since it was oversold? Regardless, he and the others should have received Denied Boarding Compensation, but sounds like that wasn’t offered in the midst of their “choice words” at the gate/counter. Definitely agree with others that 90% of P.A. announcements in airports are unintelligible and generally you hear announcements for gates NOT your own better than at your own gate, and that it is almost never clear what boarding group is active due to myriad of procedures that vary with each airline and poor announcements and signage. Occasionally the airlines’ apps can help with notifications of active boarding/group but not all of them have this functionality (I think United does it okay if I recall correctly).