A Southwest flight attendant who claims she caught pilots watching the plane bathroom with a hidden camera said she was pressured not to tell or 'no one would ever fly our airline again'

Advertisement
A Southwest flight attendant who claims she caught pilots watching the plane bathroom with a hidden camera said she was pressured not to tell or 'no one would ever fly our airline again'

Southwest Airlines

Advertisement
  • A Southwest Airlines flight attendant said an airline official told her not to go public after allegedly finding pilots with a livestream of the plane's bathroom.
  • Media reports say Renee Steinaker was told: "if this went public, no one, I mean no one, would ever fly our airline again."
  • Steinaker is suing Southwest, claiming she saw the pilots spying on the bathroom on an iPad in 2017.
  • Southwest said it investigated and could not find any cameras, and that it will "vigorously defend the lawsuit."
  • The company claimed the incident was an "inappropriate attempt at humor," but did not give further clarification about what this means.
  • Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

A flight attendant who is suing Southwest Airlines after allegedly finding pilots watching video footage of the plane's bathroom said that an airline official told her not to go public or "no one would ever fly our airline again."

Renee Steinaker claims that she saw an iPad showing what appeared to be live footage of the plane's bathroom in the plane cockpit in 2017, and that one of the pilots told her it was "top secret security measure," according to court documents.

Also in the complaint, Steinaker says that an unnamed airline official told her to keep quiet about it, telling her: "If this got out, if this went public, no one, I mean no one, would ever fly our airline again," according to the UK's Daily Mail newspaper.

Steinaker, who has worked for Southwest for decades, is now suing the airline for emotional distress, negligence, invasion of privacy, and sexual harassment, according to the The New York Times reported.

Advertisement

Southwest said that it investigated the plane and couldn't find any cameras. It told the Times on Saturday that it will "vigorously defend the lawsuit."

"We can confirm from our investigation that there was never a camera in the lavatory," Southwest Airlines said in a statement.

The airline also called the incident "an inappropriate attempt at humor, which the company did not condone."

FILE - This July 17, 2019 photo shows Southwest Airlines planes at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport in Phoenix. Southwest Airlines Co. reports financial earns on Thursday, Oct. 24. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin, File)

It did not respond to the Mail's request for clarification about what it meant by an "attempt at humor."

Advertisement

Steinaker also said in the lawsuit that she and her husband, also a Southwest flight attendant, experienced what they believed was retaliation from managers.

They both kept working for the airline after filing the lawsuit, which claims that Southwest let the two pilots keep flying.

The lawsuit claims that she took a photo of the iPad display in the cockpit with her phone.

Steinaker said that the pilot who noticed her looking at it looked "panicked" when he realized. She claims that he admitted that it was a live steam of the bathroom, but claimed it was a secret security measure installed in the plane model, a Boeing 737-800.

She said that both pilots immediately left the plane after it landed, which is against the airline's policy. Lawyers for the two pilots did not respond to the Times.

Advertisement
{{}}