Man attempts to flag down departing flight…from tarmac

An early morning Ryanair flight from Dublin to Amsterdam saw a bit of a commotion last week. Well…the commotion was land-side. A man arrived late, and the boarding door was already closed. After becoming belligerent with gate staff, he started banging on the window. ‘Cause that is really gonna help you get on that plane.

Eventually, he was able to break through a door that headed out to the apron and attempted to flag the plane down. Ryanair staff restrained him while they waited for airport police to arrive, who had already been called. Now he is facing a criminal damage charge in addition to missing his flight.

Watching your “departed” flight depart

I get it. It’s tough arriving at the gate just minutes (or seconds) after that door closes. The gate agents have to draw the line somewhere, but it can be aggravating if you fall on the wrong side. You get to sit there and watch your “departed” flight sit at the gate for yet a little while longer, all the while thinking, “it’s been more than enough time for me to get on and settled.”

One of my least favorite travel experiences was missing a Southwest flight. I was on a United inbound and stupidly gave myself only 2 hours between flights at LAX. Given that our United flight ended up getting to the gate over an hour late, I ultimately missed my flight by about 5 minutes. I then watched my plane depart (and then 3 more full 737s) before I finally got a seat flying standby, thanks to the “flat tire rule”.

Just don’t resort to chasing your plane down like this guy did. It’ll just end in a scuffle with airport police and probably some social media posts and a news story, just like this one.

I’m not sure what he was going to do had he actually caught it anyway. Climb the landing gear?

Note: I do know that the area where planes park is actually called the apron. Tarmac is still just too colloquial.