A couple who got into an argument with a passenger who reclined their seat will no longer fly with Cathay Pacific.
The Hong Kong-based airline banned two people after a video of an in-flight altercation on a long-haul flight was released on September 17, a statement posted on social media platform Xiaohongshu said. .
The video, posted on the same platform often referred to as China’s Instagram, shows the couple taunting and pushing a woman leaning backwards with vulgar gestures during a 14-hour flight from Hong Kong female passenger chair.
Cathay Pacific has not yet responded to CNBC’s request for comment, but said in a statement that it had “sincerely” apologized for the incident.
“We maintain a zero-tolerance policy for any behavior that violates safety regulations or disrespects the rights of other passengers,” the company wrote, according to a Chinese translation by CNBC.
The woman, who recounted parts of the video posted on the same platform, said the couple harassed her after she refused to return her seat to an upright position.
In the video, she said she asked a flight attendant for help.
“I was shocked because it was not meal time, but the flight attendant… she asked me to compromise, so I rejected the suggestion,” the woman said in the video, according to CNBC’s Chinese translation.
She claimed the harassment intensified after staff failed to intervene. The video captured her chair moving as she was kicked and pushed from behind. The video shows that she was eventually moved to another seat.
However, Cathay Pacific said in a statement that on-board staff had issued two “serious” verbal warnings to two disruptive passengers.
This unruly behavior resulted in nearby passengers intervening. Passengers can be heard saying in the video: “Be polite!” “Don’t bully that little girl!” “You bring shame to us Hong Kong people.”
One of the banned passengers repeatedly called the reclining passenger a “mainlander”.
Internet reaction
Despite Cathay Pacific’s ban, many social media users in mainland China criticized the airline’s initial response to the controversy.
“Only after others spoke out did Cathay Pacific try to rectify the situation. Cathay Pacific being unfriendly to mainland travelers is not news to me,” said one popular comment.
For many mainlanders, the incident reminded them of another scandal that caused a stir on Chinese social media last year. The airline fired three flight attendants after a video went viral, in which the crew can be heard mocking a non-English-speaking passenger for incorrectly using the word “carpet” when requesting a blanket.
Social media platforms such as Xiaohongshu are filled with reports of mainlanders claiming to have been mistreated in Hong Kong. Some of them say they feel discriminated against in the city – where locals speak Cantonese rather than Mandarin, China’s official dialect.
The divide between mainland China and Hong Kong has been a long-standing issue, rooted in economic and cultural differences between mainland China and the former British territory that returned to Chinese rule in 1997.
Tensions further intensified during the 2019-2020 Hong Kong protests, with some locals rebelling against Beijing’s tightening control over the city.
Cathay Pacific was also caught in the crossfire at the time, as it sought to quell the anger of the Chinese government after some employees took part in pro-democracy protests.
To tilt or not to tilt?
As “airplane etiquette” becomes more important as in-flight behavior continues to deteriorate, reclining seats – once a common and harmless behavior – has developed into another in-flight battleground.
Seat pitch (roughly the distance between the front and rear seats) has continued to shrink as passengers have grown larger, leading to controversy in the air over the smallest amount of aircraft space (the area from the middle seat armrest to under the passenger seat).
Unlike those issues on which there was consensus – two armrests for the middle seat and the area under the seat in front of the passenger being allocated – there was widespread disagreement over the issue of seat tilt.
Proponents often argue that seats recline for a reason, while opponents argue that it’s inconsiderate, “full stop,” when done in economy class.
However, more people said the answer depends on a variety of factors, including the flight departure time, the length of the flight, whether the passenger seat in the back can recline and whether the passenger’s permission is first obtained.
