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Last month, Delta Airlines flight 876 – with service from Atlanta to Columbia, South Carolina – made an emergency landing after crew members radioed to report the presence of smoke inside the Boeing 717-200 aircraft.
The incident took place shortly after 9:00 a.m. EST on Monday, February 24, 2025. The plane was carrying 94 passengers and five crew members when it abruptly returned to Hartsfield-Jackson airport after “the crew reported possible smoke in the flightdeck,” per the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
Upon landing, the flight crew commenced an immediate evacuation of the plane using inflatable slides.
Over the weekend, an article in The New York Post focused on one of the passengers on the plane – a woman who reportedly hails from Columbia, S.C. The yet-to-be-named female passenger was blasted for “violating the golden airline safety rule dictating that carry-on bags should be left behind during an emergency.”
Which bags did she take? From the looks of it, all of them…
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The Post based its coverage on a thread posted to Reddit entitled “What NOT to do in an evacuation,” which featured commenters excoriating the woman for defying crew orders and potentially endangering fellow passengers by grabbing all of her carry-on belongings during the evacuation.
One Reddit commenter noted the woman in question “needs to be placed on a NO FLY LIST for life.”
“This chick would film you die rather than help you,” another added.
“She’s got a full blown case of main character syndrome,” yet another noted.
“Isn’t it a crime to disobey the instructions of flight crew?” still another wondered. “I wish we prosecuted this type of dangerous behavior or, at least, put someone on the ‘no fly’ list.”
The comments – which got a lot more brutal than that – underscored a critical safety point. The FAA requires aircraft manufacturers demonstrate that all passengers and crew can be evacuated from an aircraft within ninety (90) seconds.
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The problem? Recent assessments of this rule have found that shrinking seat size and spacing on aircraft – along with narrow, crammed aisles – have made it impossible to enforce.
One constant in evacuation guidance is to leave all carry-on items on the plane. In fact, last January the orderly evacuation of Japan Airlines Flight 516 following a runway collision with a Japanese Coast Guard plane saved the lives of all 379 people on board the passenger jet.
According to a Royal Aeronautical Society (RAS) review of the evacuation, one of the key components of its success was attributable to the fact “passengers did not take baggage or other items with them when leaving the aircraft.”
“Passengers may have remembered the information in the pre-flight safety briefing regarding not taking baggage in an emergency evacuation,” it added.
Clearly this woman missed that briefing…
FITSNews is endeavoring to confirm the identity of the woman, who is rumored to reside in Columbia, S.C.
Stay tuned for updates…
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR …
Will Folks is the founding editor of the news outlet you are currently reading. Prior to founding FITSNews, he served as press secretary to the governor of South Carolina. He lives in the Midlands region of the state with his wife and eight children.
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3 comments
Never met so many selfish people until I moved here. Blaming all the libs (sorry).
What a ridiculous comment. Seriously. Try having a thought of your own that requires brain power, instead of parrotting your master.
Really? I’ve found just the opposite – I guess you need to be more selective when choosing your friends.