It was a cold morning yesterday in Buffalo, NY.
I’m sure that the JetBlue passengers were not happy about the 4-hour delay to their Floridian destination.
That is, until they learned that the delay was cause by the detention of their pilot, who had attempted to board the flight to take command while drunk (at more than four times over the FAA’s blood-alcohol limit).
I wonder what would have happened if the TSA agent had not noticed the pilot’s drunkenness. What if a flight attendant had noticed? Would he have spoken up? What if the co-pilot had noticed? Would she have spoken up? I expect they would, given how safety-focused everyone is in the aerospace industry.
Well, not everyone, evidently.
I also wonder if airline employees receive training on how to respond when they see a pilot willing to operate the aircraft under the influence? I wonder, because that type of training is not commonplace in most organizations. We tell employees about the importance of reporting, and we remind them of the channels available, but we rarely tell them exactly how to report. It’s an important gap, especially when the wrongdoing is committed by an intimidating person in authority, like a pilot or an executive.
The Ethical Leader 