Yesterday I wrote about a pregnant mother who was kicked off a Spirit Airlines flight with her husband and children because her two-year-old allegedly could not keep her mask on. Spirit Airlines initially blamed the parents but has since silently re-worded its blame.
Spirit Airlines Backtracks On “Adult” Blame For Mask Incident
If you missed it, check out details and video of the incident here.
Initially, Spirit Airlines claimed the family was thrown off because mom and dad–not the child–refused to wear mask:
But without explanation, the statement was updated to remove direct blame from the parents and updated its statement:
This likely reflects that Ari and Avital Eisenberg have insisted they abided by Spirit’s mask guidelines and witnesses onboard backed them up.
For example:
I was on the plane. The parents were complying, and the child was eating. Most of the crew agreed there was nothing wrong. There’s a reason the family was let back on the plane while the FA was kicked off.
— yuneeq (@yuneeq) April 6, 2021
Some have pointed out that the Ari Eisenberg was not even complying with the mask mandate in widely-circulated video of the incident:
SHAME ON YOU, @SpiritAirlines.
Folks, watch this video, and kudos to this young African American lady for standing up for this poor pregnant Jewish mom pic.twitter.com/jKjm6qGFMT
— Reagan Battalion (@ReaganBattalion) April 6, 2021
Yes, the father did lower his mask to speak to flight attendant. No, he should not have done that. But I find masks muffle your voice and I’m willing to give him the benefit of the doubt that in a moment of incredulity over what was happening to his family, he simply wanted to be understood.
CONCLUSION
As a general rule, I may not like masks, but I’ve become used to them and have enjoyed not even having a cold this year. I will continue to wear them. But requiring two-year-olds to wear mask is absurd. While the federal mask mandate now requires this, all U.S. airlines (except for Delta) required this long before the federal mandate.
The family was let back onboard on for a reason…Spirit Airlines should just apologize and move on.
The new variants are attacking children. 77000 odd kids have been affected in the state of Maharashtra in India during this surge we are experiencing.
Similar variants are probably circulating in the USA as well. Mask up, as difficult as it might be. Or lose your child to the disease like the one who died of Covid in my apartment complex last night.
Masks are not a well known deterrent enough to justify this type of behavior. If you can take it off to eat, you can certainly take it off to discuss this situation. It is obscured and an insult to most people intelligence. So sick of the mask crap.