A 63-year-old man went into cardiac arrest during a flight from the U.K. to Sweden. The airline crew said that the man had low-blood pressure and offered him a soda and a sandwich to make him feel better. Once the man started feeling a little better the airline told him he had to pay-up! RyanAir made the sick passenger pay for his sandwich (soda is given for free on most flights) SMH! The man may be able to take legal actions against the airline for the mistreatment. Read more about the man’s story after the jump.
@Julie1205
When Per-Erik Jonsson went into a cardiac arrest on a RyanAir flight from the U.K. to Sweden on Sunday, all the airline staff did was offer him a sandwich.
Jonsson, 63, broke into a cold sweat and asked his wife for some water roughly one hour into the flight, Sweden’s The Local reports.
His wife soon realized that Jonsson had lost consciousness and alerted plane staff as Jonsson’s stepdaughter, Billie Appleton, tried to rouse him.
“He didn’t respond when I tried to shake him. But after I slapped him in the chest, he began breathing again,” Appleton, who happens to be a nurse, told The Local. Appleton said she shouted for a doctor and told flight crew that Jonsson needed oxygen.
But the flight crew, Appleton claims, was ill-equipped to handle the situation. Instead, she says, the airline “said he had low blood pressure and gave him a sandwich and a soda.”
Appleton slapped Jonsson on the chest to get him to breath again, news.com.au reports.
Once Jonsson had recovered slightly, the flight crew came to the family asking for payment for the sandwich and soda.
EU regulations mandate that cabin crew be trained in first-aid and pilots should alert air traffic control about a seriously ill passenger.
In a statement to The Local, Ryanair defended the cabin crew, saying they had acted appropriately.
“In line with procedures for such cases a Ryanair cabin crew suggested a diversion to the nearest airport or to have an ambulance on stand-by on arrival at Skavsta, so that the passenger could receive medical treatment,” the spokesman said. Yet the Jonsson family says the airline did not, in fact, have an ambulance waiting and instead drove Jonsson to the hospital themselves.
“We want Ryainair to apologize,” Billie Appleton told Fox News. As such, the family is considering legal action.
This is just the latest round of bad publicity for the budget airline and CEO Michael O’Leary (above). Lily Allen caused a bit of an uproar in June over boarding pass fees and there was, after all, a mutiny on a flight in the Canary Islands back in February.
