By IINA,
Washington : AirTran Airways yesterday apologized to passengers on a flight delayed because a group of Muslims were removed from the plane after passengers became concerned about their comments. Meanwhile, the Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) said it filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Transportation on the incident and hopes for a DOT investigation “to determine the facts.” The nine travelers, including Kashif Irfan, members of his extended family and a friend were ultimately cleared by authorities at Washington’s Reagan National Airport after questioning Thursday.
The passengers were not allowed to re-book on another AirTran flight because, at the time they went to a service counter, the airline had not yet been notified of the clearance by authorities. AirTran, which has its operational hub at Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, said it has refunded the fares of Irfan, his wife and three children, his wife’s sister, his brother, his brother’s wife and a friend, all of whom were detained, and will reimburse them for the expense of taking US Airways to Orlando instead of AirTran.
AirTran also offered to transport them home to Washington, D.C. for free. “While ultimately this issue proved to be a misunderstanding, the steps taken were necessary,” AirTran said in the statement. The Friday afternoon apology came after an earlier statement from the airline explained the circumstances and said the carrier complied with all directives and “had no discretion in the matter.”
Irfan, an anesthesiologist, said the women in his group wear Islamic head scarves and the men have beards, and most were born in the U.S.. He said his brother and his brother’s wife “were speaking generally about airplane safety and what the safest place to sit on the airplane would be.” Their comments, overheard by other passengers, resulted in their being removed from the plane by two air marshals. The flight was delayed by nearly two hours, and took off for Orlando without the nine passengers that were detained.
FBI spokesman Bill Carter said the passengers interviewed were cooperative, and the FBI found that they posed no threat. The Transportation Security Administration in a statement said, “TSA counts a vigilant traveling public as an important layer of security and continues to encourage passengers to be alert and report suspicious activity.” Nusrat Choudhury, an attorney in the racial justice program at the American Civil Liberties Union, said the ACLU “is disturbed that in 2009, seven years after 9/11, we continue to receive reports from Muslims and people of Arab and South Asian descent that they are treated differently by airline and security officials even when they pose no threat to security or safety.