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Flight Attendants Get Training To Spot Trouble

Good Question: How Do They Teach Flight Attendants To Deal With Unruly Behavior?

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DENVER (CBS4) ― "This is not playtime anymore, they actually mean business," said new flight attendant Rebecca Klatt.  "And this has been a very rough day. I don't think any of us knew what we were in for."  

Rough and tumble in an old gym at Lowry. Experts from Community College of Aurora were contracted by federal air marshals to give the sometimes slight attendants a few moves to stop trouble.  

"People are ready to fly off the handle," flight attendant Karen Anderson said. "It could be weather related. It could be something personal and it could have been something that the airline did to them unintentionally."

Frontier in-flight training specialist Joshua Smith said things have gotten less courteous since 2001.  

"As we saw after 9/11, passengers were very calm, very polite with everybody, but the further away that we get from any major incident, the more aggressive passengers become," Smith said.  

There have been reports of drunk passengers throwing soda cans, trying to open aircraft doors and starting fights. Smith and other trainers try to tell new attendants that the best thing is to stop things before they get to the point of restraining people.  

"When we have to do those, that means we have to divert an aircraft, and when we have to divert an aircraft, and by diverting an aircraft that means it takes away people's time and it takes away money from people and from the airline," Smith said.

"Why would we want to get involved into a physical confrontation? It's not worth it," said Anderson, who is both a flight attendant for Frontier and one of the people doing the training in some of the rough stuff.  

Anderson and the other instructors tell attendants to create distance in a physical confrontation.  

"I'm going to be able to give you a little bit of distraction, maybe do a little bit of harm if need be, depending on the threat," Anderson said. "And create some distance, get some help."  

The help might come from other passengers, who have shown a willingness to jump in, but they can overdo it. Attendants are taught to direct helpful passengers in wrapping up unruly passengers with tape, but also taught to never give up the scissors.

Anderson said when passengers arrive, flight attendants are naturally aware.  

"We don't profile our passengers," Anderson said. "But it's human nature for us to be very aware of how somebody's acting. I may be greeting you, welcoming you on board, 'Hi how are you doing today?' But at the same time, I'm engaging eye contact. I'm also trying to smell to see if you've had an excessive amount of alcohol perhaps."  

Alcohol often spells trouble, but there are also people who may have other issues.  

"If you don't look at me or maybe you try to avoid my gaze, you know maybe there's something going on with you that I want to keep in my mind, keep an eye on you," Anderson said.

There's also the terrorist threat. Fight attendants were the first to die on 9/11 and many have forgotten that they are the first line of defense. With new training now based on the training given to air marshals, they might have a better chance.   

"I may be the 5-foot-2, 45-year-old flight attendant, but if you pose a threat to myself, my fellow crew members or the passengers on board, we're going to be able to deal with the situation accordingly," Anderson said.

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