A Southwest Airlines flight was delayed by more than an hour after a frustrated flight attendant demanded passengers clean up spilled rice from in the middle of the aisle.
Passengers said the mess was made almost immediately after travelers began boarding the plane from Atlanta, Georgia, to Houston, Texas, on Saturday. But the irate flight attendant demanded those on board the flight cleaned it up before they took to the skies, with one passenger sharing the story on social media.
Jennifer Schaper documented the drama on the April 15 flight at Georgia’s Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport on Twitter, explaining that the flight crew appeared to be at the end of a long working stint and low on patience. "Just boarded the plane and somebody spilled food. The flight attendant screamed 'who spilled rice?' and is walking up and down the aisles," she wrote in her tweet, along with a picture of the spilled rice.
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"They are refusing to leave the gate until someone cleans the rice." Schaper, who dubbed the incident “#RiceGate,” said she and some other passengers couldn’t believe the pre-flight drama, laughing as they waited for someone to ‘fess up.’ “The people in my row and I now have the giggles and she’s looking at us suspiciously,” she said.
Updating her followers about the situation, Schaper said in a follow-up tweet: “Update: they are still refusing to leave until the rice has been cleaned. They are sending out for a broom. #RiceGate” She also shared a video, in which the flight attendant can be heard apologising for the delay and saying that as “I don’t think you wanna walk through it”, the mess needs to be taken care of before the flight is able to leave.
Despite the messed getting cleaned up, Schaper claimed the flight attendant was clearly angry the culprit never came forward — and scolded everyone. “Rice is getting cleaned but she is MAD. She has let us all know that we were not raised right and she is disappointed in all of us,” she wrote.
Schaper, who nicknamed the flight “the Voyage of the Damned,” revealed that there a further delay to the flight taking off once the rice had been cleaned up as “another loud angry woman went to the bathroom during #RiceGate and we still can’t take off because she is not at her seat.”
In her final update on the #RiceGate saga, Schaper said the flight suffered a bit of turbulence in the air, which meant no beverage service. “I think it was punishment,” she quipped.
Southwest Airlines apologised for the lack of refreshments, writing in a reply: “We’re sorry that our crew was unable to provide onboard refreshments due to bumpy travel conditions. Safety is always our number one priority, but we hope that we can make it up to you next time.”
Schaper later took to Twitter to make it clear that she was not the one who spilled the rice and that whoever did should've cleaned it up. "However, SWA staff was out of line in how they handled the situation and continued to delay an already delayed flight," she wrote.
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