Since I am a Widebody Airline Captain I think I have a good grasp on what happens. I did not read he complained about a free upgrade but he was offered a seat by others. This was not just some disabled person he was DISABLED protecting the freedoms we as Americans enjoy and deserves better.

Why are you so quick to throw the crew under the bus?Oh,I'm sorry I forgot-the media is always right-must be the crew's fault.

OK my bad if someone did offer to switch seats then my statement stands. How often do we throw gate attendants under the bus because they make our deadheading harder?

I have been deadheading home trying to catch one of lifes moments that for everyone else is easy to catch and had crews go way out of their way to make sure I was comfortable. I have also made sure it happened for others on my flights, part of the job NO but should be done regardless. We should look out for each other as much as possible. Even though I did not serve I include the fine men and women who protect my freedoms by serving in the military especially one who lost so much.

This rests on management for hammering gate agents and FA's with on time departure nonsense. If you leave 5 minutes late but take care of you passengers, the pilots can more often than not make that time up.

Now, I don't know when the seats were offered. Were they offered right as he boarded or was he already in the back of the plane and the isle chair already gone? If it could have been done in a reasonable amount of time, it should have been done. If you were all buttoned up and ready to go, I'm sorry but the time to do it was 10 minutes ago.

I wouldn't be quick to throw the FA's under the bus as they are taking their orders from people who only look at performance numbers and aren't out there day to day taking care of and dealing with the passengers and probably fear they will be disciplined for taking a delay.

The gate agent last night who blocked the Deadheading Capt from sitting in a nice seat up front (long leg) because she saved it for her family member non reving

Is that allowed? If its known for a fact that's what happened, that agent could be in heap big trouble over that if tis followed up on.

I don't get it. He's disabled and felt bad that he boarded last, and couldn't get a first class seat? If he wanted a first class seat that badly, all he had to do was pay for it...:rolleyes:

I agree that it can be an uncomfortable experience to travel if you are disabled, but people do it all the time without crying.

Really? She mustn't travel very much:rolleyes:

I hope his plan was not to book a coach seat and show up fully expecting a FC upgrade. FC is almost always full anyway, so to show up, especially last minute, expecting to trade seats with someone already in FC and getting mad when it doesn't happen is pretty unreasonable. Blaming the airline in that situation is even more unfair. Flying with a major illness/fever (was it contageous?) just adds more guaranteed bad outcome to this.

If I was in FC I would have traded with him, and I think we do need to empower front line employees to take a few minutes to work out important issues over the all mighty D-0 so while we could have possibly handeled this better, it is very unreasonable to try and accuse DL of being anti veteran or whatever the thesis of that article was trying to do.

Why didn't they move him to FC after they were airborne with those that offered to switch? D+0 met, FAA regs met (door closed).

Methinks this is being blown out of proportion by the media and the Col (?) mentioned in the other thread with an agenda.

104F he should not have been flying in any seat - other than an air ambulance.

Was he even in uniform?

How would anyone know he's a Vet unless he was?

Sounds to me like he ended up sitting next to this one gal, in back, who later, found out he was a vet, and then she back filled the "Delta hates Vets" story enroute.

If he was in uniform, why didn't one of the F/C seat swappers swap with him as he went by, rather than wait until he was all the way in the back, or as mentioned above, swap after takeoff?