Flight Delayed Over Passenger’s TV Screen Protest

The ultra-Orthodox Jewish traveler objected to the use of in-flight TV screens and refused to sit down until the devices were disabled.

An Israel-bound flight from Kiev’s Boryspil International Airport (KBP) was delayed earlier this week when an unnamed ultra-Orthodox Jewish passenger refused to take his seat unless the plane’s overhead TV screens were retracted or disabled. The incident occurred on Thursday just as UP Flight LY2654 was preparing to depart from KBP. UP is the low-cost subsidiary of El Al, Israel’s national carrier.

According to the Times of Israel, the plane was delayed by more than an hour when the devout passenger took objection to the content being shown and he then refused to take his seat unless the screens were disabled.

Sports reporter Amit Horsky, a passenger on the flight, made a mobile phone recording of the incident, in which the man is shown refusing to sit down.

Having posted the clip to Facebook, the outlet reported Horsky as saying, “Every attempt by the crew and passengers to convince him [to sit down] didn’t help. The plane, which was already on the runway, returned to the gate. The door was opened and an El Al security guard boarded the plane. After much pleading the ‘righteous man’ agreed to sit down.”

“I want to stress that dozens of ultra-Orthodox passengers on the flight yelled at the man […] They told him that he was wasting important time for the 200 people whom he was detaining. An argument broke out between them which at times got very loud,” Horsky added.

El Al, UP’s parent company, confirmed that the flight did eventually take off, but only after the man and his family were provided with eye masks to visually block the content being shown on the overhead screens, which were not disabled as per the man’s initial demand.

In a statement quoted by the paper, El Al confirmed the incident saying, “After a conversation with the plane’s crew and after it was made clear to him that [the plane] could not take off if he refused to listen to instructions, the passenger sat in his seat and the flight departed. At his request, he and his family received blindfolds.”

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