- An
Alaska Airlines flight was reportedly delayed due to itspilots falling out. - Five Twitter users told of the same event, which the
travel site One Mile at a Time also reported.
Two pilots who got into an argument on board an Alaska Airlines flight forced the plane to return to the terminal and face a
One Mile at a Time first reported the
According to flight-tracking websites Cirium and Flight Aware, on Monday, Alaska flight AS1080 from Washington to San Francisco was delayed by two and a half hours.
Part of the delay was due to bad weather conditions, but another factor was that the two pilots didn't get along, five Twitter users — who claimed to be passengers onboard the flight — posted on Monday.
One of the pilots announced to the passengers that the plane was returning to the airport gate, where he would disembark from the plane because he and the other pilot couldn't get along, per the Twitter posts. The pilot said they made the decision in the interest of safety, according to the Twitter posts.
Alaska Airlines told Insider that the plane returned to the gate after the captain and first officer had a "professional disagreement." The airline said "the pilots did the right thing" and they were deemed "fit to fly" after an evaluation. Alaska said it swapped the crews so the plane could fly to San Francisco. It wasn't clear what the pilots were arguing about.
One Twitter user uploaded a clip, which they said captured the end of the pilot's announcement.
Another Twitter user posted a video, which they claimed was of one pilot walking away from the flight.
"After an hour and a half delay, we now return to the terminal due to 'a failure of the captain and first officer to get along,'" one of the Twitter users wrote.
Another person tweeted that the pilot who left the plane was "fuming" after returning to the airport gate.
One Twitter user posted that the flight had already been pushed back because of bad weather, but then the pilot said he and his first officer couldn't get along and left the plane for safety reasons.
Another Twitter user, who also said they were on board the plane, described the incident as "incredibly unprofessional" and said the flight attendants had no idea what was going on.
According to another passenger, who also tweeted about being on the flight, Alaska Airlines offered them $175 for the disruption.
One Mile at a Time reported that Alaska Airlines found a replacement pilot who was supposed to fly to Los Angeles the same day. The Los Angeles flight had longer delays than the San Francisco flight, according to the report and Flight Aware.
The reported incident comes at a time when airlines are scrambling to provide full services to passengers during high summer demand, as well as severe staff shortages due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Crew members have spoken out about their experiences of heavy workloads and angry, abusive passengers amid flight delays and cancellations.