- Joshua Strickland arrested in Manchester following violent and abusive behaviour onboard

Leading leisure airline, Jet2.com, has issued a lifetime ban to disruptive passenger, Joshua Strickland, plus billed him £12,000 after his abusive and aggressive outburst led to a divert to Manchester Airport yesterday lunchtime.

The 21 year old from York, who had been consuming his own alcohol illicitly, started verbally threatening a family travelling on the Leeds Bradford to Larnaca flight. When a cabin crew member stepped in to try to calm him down he started to make physical threats towards her and also began to punch the seats. Strickland’s behaviour became so abusive and aggressive that he had to be restrained and the captain made the immediate decision to divert to Manchester for the safety and wellbeing of the other customers and crew onboard.

On arrival he was arrested by Greater Manchester Police and this morning was charged for acting in a way to endanger an aircraft or a person on that aircraft.

Phil Ward, managing director of Jet2.com, said: “We will not tolerate anyone being threatening towards families and crew on our flights. We are committed to stamping out abusive and aggressive behaviour for the safety of everyone onboard. Joshua Strickland’s violent outburst was absolutely unacceptable and caused a lot of distress plus significant delays for our customers. He now has to face up to the consequences of his actions and we will vigorously pursue to recover the costs incurred by this unnecessary divert.”

Jet2.com’s Onboard Together initiative commits the airline to a zero tolerance stance against disruptive passenger behaviour. So far more than 500 passengers have been refused travel and over 60 of these have been given lifetime bans.