Passenger slaps pilot for delay in flight

In a video that has gone viral, a passenger rose in fury from his seat to slap a pilot who was announcing a delay in the flight.

The incident took place on IndiGo’s 6E2175 service from Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport to Dabolim in Goa. The plane was scheduled to take off at 7:40 am but, according to flight tracking website FlightAware, departed at 5:33 pm, after prolonged delays, including heavy fog limited visibility, and an enforced change of crew due to flight duty time limitations.

The disturbing video of the assault – widely shared online – also shows the IndiGo crew rushing to help the pilot and members of the cabin crew hysterically remonstrating with the passenger identified as Sahil Kataria, telling him (in Hindi), “You can’t do this… you can’t do this!”. To which he responded, “Why can’t I do this? Why can’t I?”

A passenger punched an Indigo capt in the aircraft as he was making delay announcement. The guy ran up from the last row and punched the new Capt who replaced the previous crew who crossed FDTL. Unbelievable ! @DGCAIndia @MoCA_GoI pic.twitter.com/SkdlpWbaDd

— Capt_Ck (@Capt_Ck) January 14, 2024

Addressing the passenger, the air hostess said that what he did was very wrong. The other passengers also blamed Indigo for delaying flights.
The passenger, later taken into custody by the security staff.

The plane pilot lodged a complaint against the passenger with Delhi Police, based on which an FIR has been registered and further investigation is underway.
In a lengthy post on X, Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia said the “unprecedented fog” had led to, at times, “zero visibility” and this had forced authorities to shut down operations on the Delhi airport’s runways.

Yesterday, Delhi witnessed unprecedented fog wherein visibility fluctuated for several hours, and at times, dropped to zero between 5 AM to 9 AM.

The authorities, therefore, were compelled to enforce a shut-down of operations for some time even on CAT III runways (CAT III…

— Jyotiraditya M. Scindia (@JM_Scindia) January 15, 2024