A legroom fight caused a Delta flight headed from New York to West Palm Beach to make an impromptu stop Monday, the fourth flight to be grounded by combative passengers in roughly a week.
"This woman sitting next to me knitting tried reclining her seat back, [and] the woman behind her started screaming and swearing," passenger Aaron Klipin
told News 4 Jax of Jacksonville, where the flight landed to release the unruly woman. The woman, later identified as 32-year-old Amy Fine of Boca Raton, told police she was sleeping on the tray table, and was knocked in the head when the woman in front of her reclined her seat.
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"[Fine] demanded the flight land. She said something to the effect of, 'I don't care about the consequences, put this plane down now,'" said Klipin. "The flight attendant spoke to the captain while somebody was blocking her path to the cabin. A few minutes later an announcement came on that we were diverting to Jacksonville."
Other passengers reported that they had no idea what was going on, that all they could see and hear was a general disturbance, and then the plane began to decrease in altitude. They were only assuaged of their worst fears when the captain finally made an announcement.
After the flight landed and local law enforcement removed Fine, Delta Air Lines released a statement that said in part that the captain of Flight 2370 made the decision to land the plane "out of an abundance of caution."
On the ground, Fine said she was upset and in the process of grieving for her two dogs who recently died. She was not charged with a crime. Federal authorities instructed the local police to let her go after filing their report, taking up responsibility for the case.
The flight continued on to West Palm Beach, landing a few hours late.
According to Reuters, the incident follows on the heels of a fight aboard a United flight between a man using "Knee Defender" devices to keep the woman in front of him from reclining, which led to her throwing a cup of water in his face.
Just a few days later, a 60-year-old French man was charged in court with interfering with crewmembers after fighting with them and other passengers over a reclining seat.
In yet another incident, two female friends grounded a Sunwing flight from Toronto to Cuba after drunkenly setting off their flight's smoke alarms with cigarettes, then getting into a fight over who was to blame.
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