A woman was thrown off an American Airlines flight for, if you can believe it, having a nut allergy.
That’s right. American Airlines staff allegedly told Sophie Draper, a 26-year-old woman from Durham, that the airline was contractually obliged to serve nuts in business class, and it was against their company policy to make any allergy-related announcements. She was soon after “escorted” off the flight.
Draper tells the story as follows, recently taking to Twitter to share what happened, seeing as the airline did not provide her with, in her view, a satisfactory response to her complaint.
I’ve shared my experience to warn those with nut & other food allergies about @AmericanAir. Their discriminating company policy forbids them making allergy announcements which protect you. Also being told that they contractually HAD to serve nuts in 1st/Business class (15/16)
— Sophie Draper (@EnergySoph) February 6, 2022
Draper, who is an electrical engineer, was flying from Heathrow to JFK Airport in New York in December when the incident happened.
Draper describes the incident as follows: “Given @AmericanAir (AA) have still yet to respond to the complaint my partner submitted over a month ago, thought I’d come to Twitter to share my nightmare experience when I was meant to fly with them from @HeathrowAirport to NYC (JFK) at the beginning of December 2021.”
“We tried to inform AA of my life threatening allergy to nuts/peanuts before flying but there is no option to inform them online. At checkin we were told to speak to airline staff at the gate — standard practice with airlines flown with in the past: EasyJet, AirCanada etc.”
“However, this is where things begin to unravel. Firstly, I was met with confused looks by AA gate staff when I told them about my severe allergy. They asked if it would be okay if people around me could still eat nuts (I informed them that my allergy is airborne, so no).”
“To which the member of staff bluntly told us…