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10th January 2025
11:56am GMT
On Thursday, Ryanair spoke of the “intolerable” behaviour staff had to deal with from one man on a flight from Dublin to Lanzarote.
He was causing so much disruption that the flight had to be re-routed to Porto, where 160 passengers had to remain overnight - losing a day of their holidays.
Ryanair is now looking to receive €15,000 in damages against this person and a spokesperson said the airline will take legal action against anyone in future if a similar disruption is caused.
Speaking to Newstalk Breakfast, Dara Brady said: “If you get on a flight and you’ve taken too much alcohol, if you’re on a flight and it’s non-alcohol related and your behaviour is intolerable, we will do whatever we can to ensure that we follow up on it.
“It’s very, very serious because it is about protecting the other passengers and the crew who are flying with us.
“We want to make that as enjoyable as possible.”
Aviation expert, Simon Daly said he would describe the move as “absolutely the right approach” from Ryanair to deter people from acting inappropriately on their flights.
“It’s a show of force and it acts as a deterrent against other passengers,” he said.
“But this is an issue that has risen exponentially since restrictions were lifted post-pandemic - not just in Europe but globally.
“[Figures show] from 2021 to 2023, there’s quite a steep rise in unruly passengers.”
Mr Daly went on to say that these kinds of delays have become a “major cost to the airlines” and more generally, a “major inconvenience” for passengers who do behave well.
“I think €15,000 is quite a low amount for them to pursue,” he said.
“If the passengers were entitled to EU261 2004 compensation and, if it was a full aircraft, then there’s another €75,600 at €400 per passenger.”
However, Mr Daly said there are other things the airline can do to ensure staff, crew and passengers have a more pleasant experience and that they do "bear some responsibility on the sale of alcohol."
“The cabin crew do their best but there’s also people coming onto the aircraft drunk," he said.
“I’ve been on a flight to Malaga where before departure… the police [were called] before the aircraft was even pushed back from the stands.
“There was abuse of the staff, abuse of the passengers over an issue with seats and they were clearly intoxicated - they probably shouldn’t have boarded the aircraft initially.”
