A new lawsuit against Alaska Airlines, the parent company of Hawaiian, has put airline accountability and passenger safety back in the Hawaii spotlight. The case, involving a passenger who alleges she was assaulted by an intoxicated seatmate on a Hawaii-bound Alaska Air flight, raises urgent questions about how airlines handle in-flight security and their role in preventing such incidents.
While news coverage has widely reported some details of the lawsuit, the more significant issue remains: are airlines ensuring passengers’ safety, or are they leaving too many risks unaddressed?
The allegations relate to a woman claiming she was sexually assaulted on an Alaska flight to Honolulu by an intoxicated passenger who was repeatedly served alcohol despite signs of impairment. According to the suit, flight attendants refilled his wine glass multiple times, and after briefly passing out, he became more intoxicated. The situation escalated when he forcibly groped the resting woman. Upon arrival, law enforcement met the man, describing him as unsteady and reeking of alcohol. The lawsuit accuses him of assault and negligence while even more importantly, also claiming the airline failed to protect the victim.
A growing concern for airline safety.
Hawaii flights often run longer than typical domestic routes; many operate as overnight red-eyes. This makes in-flight security even more critical, especially when passengers have limited mobility and rely on crew members to maintain order. The Alaska Airlines case is far from the first time concerns about onboard behavior have surfaced.
Readers of Beat of Hawaii have pointed out such risks in the past. Mike S. questioned the need for alcohol service at all, given such problems, saying, “Why do we even need to serve alcohol on a plane?” This reflects growing frustration among some passengers who feel airlines prioritize sales over passenger safety.
Oliver noted the inconsistency in airline enforcement, stating, “It’s crazy how inconsistent these (alcohol enforcement) rules seem to be. Alaska Airlines has a clearer limit in my experience, but on American, it feels like a coin toss whether you’ll get cut off or not.”
Are airlines enforcing their policies?
Airlines have policies to prevent excessive drinking and unruly behavior, but whether those policies are consistently enforced is another question. In the case involving the lawsuit, it is alleged that Alaska Airlines staff continued to serve alcohol to the male passenger despite signs that he was intoxicated. If true, it wouldn’t be the first time airline policies failed in practice.
Some readers suggest a complete ban as the only solution. Rob T. wrote, “Simple, stop selling alcohol at the airport and on the planes. Solves 99% of the problem. Much safer for flight attendants and travelers.”
But others disagree, seeing the issue as enforcement rather than elimination. Shel responded, “Again, you demand rules change for yourself. God help who sits next to you. You’ll probably tell them if the toothpaste in their purse isn’t spearmint, you will have them removed from the flight.”
This back-and-forth reflects the ongoing struggle airlines face—balancing passenger comfort and sales with the need to maintain order. Yet, if airlines claim they have straightforward policies that are uniformly enforced, passengers have good reason to ask: why aren’t they working?
Are there unique risks on Hawaii flights?
Incidents involving disruptive behavior aren’t exclusive to flights to Hawaii, but particular challenges do seem to make these routes more vulnerable.
First, Hawaii’s distance from the mainland means that once a flight is over the Pacific, options to handle a serious situation become more limited. Turning around is less feasible, and airports for emergency landings don’t exist between the West Coast and Hawaii. Second, many flights to the islands are seen as the start of a long-awaited and costly vacation, meaning some passengers may be more inclined to drink heavily before or during their journey.
Nancy R., a BOH commenter, captured this frustration, saying, “More aloha, less human stupidity. I am a retired lawyer and this whole unnecessary fiasco might well end up in litigation. To no one’s benefit. Can’t we all just find a way to rediscover our manners? Please?”
With recent incidents on multiple airlines, including mid-air disruptions leading to diversions and flight attendants reporting increased aggression, some travelers are asking if they feel safe flying.
What should airlines do next?
This lawsuit is likely to push Alaska Airlines—and others as well—to reassess their safety policies. With the airline currently absorbing Hawaiian Airlines, there are broader questions about how their combined approach to passenger safety will take shape across Seattle and Honolulu-based teams. We’ll all be watching to see whether the airline takes real substantive steps to improve enforcement or whether this becomes another case of legal action but without lasting changes.
No single solution exists, but experts suggest that airlines should consider providing flight crews with better training to recognize and stop potential issues before they escalate. Strengthening pre-flight screening for passengers who may already be intoxicated before boarding could help prevent problems before they begin. Establishing clearer policies on alcohol service and ensuring they are actually enforced, not just written in manuals, is another key area that requires attention.
One reader, Richard C., had a pretty drastic suggestion: “Pre-Flight breathalyzer test. Before being served alcohol at airport bar you must surrender your boarding pass then sign a waiver stating that you will submit to a breathalyzer test at time of closing your tab. If you test 0.10 or above your boarding pass is revoked.”
While such a policy would be difficult to implement and enforce, it highlights the growing frustration among passengers and flight crews who feel that airlines are not doing enough together.
One flight attendant, Megan, told us, “As a flight attendant, I can tell you that enforcing alcohol limits isn’t as easy as passengers might think. We’re trained to cut people off when necessary, but we’re also balancing customer service, avoiding confrontation, and managing a full cabin. Some passengers hide how much they’ve already had before boarding, and by the time we notice, it’s often too late. If airlines truly want to fix this, they need to back us up with clear policies and real consequences for even mildly disruptive behavior.
Our final thoughts.
This lawsuit against Alaska Airlines will fade from the news cycle, but the issues it raises won’t disappear. Passenger safety onboard remains a critical concern, and airlines flying to Hawaii must take a hard look at their role in preventing in-flight disturbances. Travelers deserve more than vague policies and PR responses—they deserve action that ensures a safer and more accountable flying experience.
Please share your thoughts on this latest incident and the bigger picture. Mahalo!
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I often drink on a long flight to make it easier to fall asleep, depends on how comfortable the seat is determines how much to drink, if we all would just sleep it would make everything easier to handle
Speaking of safety, do you have any idea why Hawaiian Airlines flight #89 was diverted back to Boston on Feb 17th?
Rules like breathalyzer testing will never fly. The flying public simply won’t accept that and the process will add to an already frustrating process.
Personally, I believe that bad actors should get prosecuted to the extent possible and their penalties (fines and jail time) get heavily reported in the media. And, they should get added to the no-fly list. You can’t stop people from getting drunk and/or misbehaving but you can make the pain level pretty high.
For what it’s worth, I hope that jerk gets jail time and a place on the sex offender registry.
$10,000 fine. Felony charge. Assault is assault. Zip tie hands and legs and duck tape over mouth. I’m done with this. Bad behavior requires consequences of being treated badly. I always carry a syringe of Valium. And hope they are allergic if no one has the guts to zip tie.
So, you carry a syringe with a known controlled substance on a flight!? So what exactly do you tell TSA if they find it other than lying to them and who actually gets a prescription for liquid valium?
Putting a syringe in anyone at anytime without their consent is also considered assault so just what the heck are you talking about anyway or are you just bloviating!?
F.O.L..L.O.W. the $$$.
Airlines don’t give a rip about pax safety/security, maybe only to the extent it diminishes revenue. They’ll settle out of court, using the proceeds from past/future inflight booze sales !
Too cynical you say ? Just remember it was recently the 25th anniversary of that tragic/terrifying crash of AS261. The cause was incompetent & deferred maintenance, courtesy of the darling AS …
FA’s are there for the passengers’ safety. Not to serve you. Since it is no longer a requirement for all passengers to visit the ticket counter to check-in, the only airline employees that see all passengers are the gate agents. The airlines routinely under-staff these positions. When you buy a ticket you enter into a contract with the airline and agree not to fly drunk/impaired and behave yourself subject to FAR’s. The only thing that is going to change this is for the airlines (and the airports (police)) to staff the gates and weed out the drunks (and drug impaired passengers) at that point. They should get one warning and be in an industry-wide database. Second offense should include fines, jail time and no-fly list. 90% of them will be found this way. The FAA should also fine the airlines and airports for every one of these violators that gets on a commercial aircraft. Just like ADA violations are handled.
When we fly a red eye to the mainland, I make my husband sit in the middle seat so no one can grope me. Otherwise I will sit in the middle seat and will loudly call out to stop touching me. I have done this once, and it stopped immediately. The FA did get involved, regretfully there were no empty seats. My husband likes to sit next to,the window, why should he be “punished” because an inebriated passenger couldn’t control their hands. I asked once to stop his hand on my knee, just in case it was accidental, next time I called out.
The issue of intoxicated and bad acting passengers must be addressed at the level of the FAA. Any passenger who behaves in a disruptive manner, or as in this case initiates unwelcome physical contact with another passenger or crew member, should be banned from all air travel on all carriers for a minimum of 5 years. Perhaps after documented “rehabilitation” such a person may be allowed to return to air travel. Any second offense would be lifetime ban from air travel. If such a regulation were in place, there would be a sharp reduction in such activity. Either by deterence due to the regularion or the elimination of those individuals prone to such behavior by being banned from air travel.
Demanding personal responsibility for one’s actions is the answer, not trying to get airport bars or the airlines to serve as “police” for miscreants.
Probably some entitled first class passenger who figured out the restroom was only for about 18 first class ticket holders and unoccupied most of the flight so drink away. No wait for the restroom so no problem. Might as well get my money’s worth in free drinks because I purchased a first class ticket right. Just another reason why restrooms should be treated equal to all passengers. Maybe it would solve some of the over indulgence problem.
Some people seriously have a fear of flying especially over the ocean. I don’t know if I’d rather see someone consume a couple of drinks as apposed to someone swallowing some prescribed pill or unprescribed pill to relax ones nerves. Without anything how many passengers would be prone to panic attacks and stress disorders as to claim their actions were a result of a medical condition? How many people traveling to Hawaii are first time flyers? Ya really don’t know. I just have one rule I follow when I fly. Please keep your hands to yourself. Enough said.
If they’re that afraid they can simply not fly. I have a fear of flying, but I’ve sucked it up & done so without drugs or alcohol including HI flights. But I’ve decided to stop flying bcuz of reduced seat sizes, overcrowding, poor services, too many added fees, increased incidents w/fliers, & what appears to be poor plane maintenance… the list goes on.
As someone who is 35 years C+S, the thing I miss least about social gatherings (from weddings to crowded planes)is the over-indulged who keeps drinking. Usually they are either motor mouths or think they’re bulletproof. And then there’s the misbehaving drunk, like we seem to have in this case.
Just like with guns, all the laws or rules don’t mean a thing if not enforced. I think suspending the liquor license just like they do with a bar might be a good recourse. Hey Jeff, do you folks know the laws/rules for airlines on this? 🤔
Servers in airport bars should not over serve patrons. In some states servers can be held responsible if a customer is involved in an accident after leaving the establishment. On the plane, a two drink maximum Could be the rule of thumb. It’s a six hour flight for me and occasionally I like to have a cocktail.
Link all bars in an airport. Scan driver’s license or form of i.d. and/or their boarding pass and limit each passenger to 2 cocktails, beer, or wine in a 3 hour period before a flight. Once on board, 2 of the above maxium on any flight.
If it’s accurate that flight attendants “refilled his glass several times”, this was obviously in first class. I can understand (not excuse) the hesitance of flight attendants to cut off a first class passenger who has likely paid a lot of money for his seat and the privilege of free and refillable booze. I wouldn’t want to be the flight attendant who has to make a judgment about whether to cut someone off. Any solution should be applied equally regardless of cabin, and I would suggest a specific ounces-of-alcohol maximum can be served to any passenger, with less ounces for hard liquor. Publicize it and make sure it’s enforced, and if passengers don’t like it, they can take a boat …. And obviously already inebriated passengers can’t board.
I don’t see the need to serve alcohol period, on the plane or at the airport. About 80% of the publicized problems on planes can be traced back to alcohol consumption. If someone can’t go w/o alcohol until they land at their destination; they need rehab not a trip.
I seriously doubt the pinheads who run the airlines would implement an alcohol ban. Giving up those profits is against their “religion”. They have shareholders to answer to.
Yes, I was thinking the same thing, this was probably a 1st Class cabin incident. Unlimited refills, the flight attendant not wanting to get into a confrontation with the pax about refills, “What do you mean I can’t have anymore! Since when does 1st Class mean two drinks only!”, etc.. As a former lawenforcement officer, I know the flight attendant doesn’t want to chance a physical altercation, so she refills his glass. Most pax, even if mildly intoxicated, will not behave as bad as this guy. It’s a fine line we are asking the flight crews to walk.
First of all, thanks for your service as a law enforcement officer. I disagree with you on one thing, though: Let’s face it, flight attendants are “bartenders in the sky” and as such should be responsible for the actions of the people they over-serve, just like any other bartender (or establishment).
Simple solution: 1 alcoholic beverage per passenger per flight. Personally, I don’t drink so I wouldn’t be opposed to eliminating alcohol on flights all together, but if you must, it should be limited to one. It wouldn’t solve the problem completely, because people will still drink prior to boarding, but it would drastically reduce in flight intoxication.
Aloha,
It’s been my observation over the decades that people rarely show up sober and then get drunk during the flight. Mostly these undesirables are half drunk by the time the flight boards. The gate staff do not want to deal with a drunk so they board the drunk in order to get rid of them. It seems the gate staff are more adverse to conflict than flight attendants, yet if a gate agent has a conflict they can call in the airport police. Also, I have always been convinced that the gate staff and air crew are on completely different teams, and generally airline management seems largely disinterested in taking a stand or setting strict policy. Flying has gotten so disgusting that we’re thinking of switching to cruising and we’ll drive to the coast, thank you.
Mahalo
As a couple of the folks in your article posed I am in favor of a “no alcohol in the airports or on the planes” policy. The incidents of unruly, violent, and erratic passengers have increased over the last few years. We have flown to Hawaii over a dozen times in the last 20 years and I would love to see that stay a pleasant, positive, and anticipatory trip and not an endurance test where I hope we can land safely. People can start drinking as soon as they arrive if needed. I also feel really horrible that it is on the flight crew to manage all of this as well as the multitude of other issues they have to endure from an increasingly rude and entitled public.
The place to stop this is at the gate. With no requirement to stop at the counter now, airlines need to insure there are enough gate agents for every flight. Every airlines contract for carriage states that drunk passengers can’t fly. They have to enforce this. Same for drug impairment.
Personally, I would not want to trust a flight attendant to go up against an intoxicated passenger two or more times his or her weight. I have been a few seats away from an altercation between two passengers, one of them drunk, and the brawling nearly spilled into my seat. The flight attendant couldn’t physically get between them or effectively and quickly stop it. Had the passenger not been drunk, it might have been a much calmer – or non-existent –situation. There are places in society you don’t drink and planes could be one of them.
Are the bars in the terminal held accountable for how much passengers drink before they get on the plane?
I would be in favor of no alcohol on all flights. Smoking was allowed at one time, thank heaven that is no longer allowed. Show of hands, who is in favor of banning alcohol on all flights?
Uh, no. What is happening is we are spraying the garden with DDT to kill the weeds and killing the carrots, corn and parsnips as well (LOL). I like to have a drink, occasionally two, when on my flight to HI. I’m a light drinker, but sometimes I just feel like having something to drink, then I take a nap. Telling everyone that they can’t have a drink is punishing the 99+% for the misbehavior of the very, very small number of miscreants who create a problem. Those persons stand out, and get all the attention. When people behave like that, ban them from flying! Not just one airline, but all US carriers. After a while, people will get the point. (and throw in some jail time too!)>
Yeah, right! A pre flight breathalyzer check for every passenger as if it doesn’t already take long enough to board a flight! So this would mean that the airlines go out and purchase the equipment to be used at each gate and then have to train the gate agents how to correctly use them, make periodic checks of the agents so that they are doing it correctly and then pay someone outside of the airline to re-certify that the equipment is working properly every 6 to 12 months and lets not forget the cost and waste of the covers that must be put over the mouthpiece of the breathalyzer for each and every passenger! Try again because that suggestion is just plain ridiculous!
People act like banning alcohol will solve everything, but let’s be honest—this guy was for sure drinking before he ever got on the plane. The real issue is accountability. Airlines need to enforce their own rules, otherwise what’s the point of having them?
When it comes to actually protecting passengers, suddenly airlines have no power? This is about more than alcohol.
I’m not sure banning alcohol is the answer, but airlines need to give crews more authority to cut people off much sooner. No one wants a confrontation at 35,000 feet, but if flight attendants aren’t empowered to say no, then this is what happens.
Actually, it’s not just flight attendants having the power to say “No.” It also involves the physical aspect of the potential confrontation. Some flight attendants have been slugged by this type of person. They are ‘angry drunks’, and don’t like being told what can or can’t do. When the situation deteriorates to this type of confrontation, what do we expect of the flight attendants? Duking it out with a passenger??? Personally, I think they should have a ‘trap door’ in the main isle, and nasty pax would be dropped into the luggage area to finish the flight! (gets kinda Cold down there!)
I feel for this woman. Imagine having to deal with something horrifying mid-flight. What I want to know is what the flight attendants were thinking. Why keep serving someone?
You never know who’s going to be sitting next to you, and too many people use flights as an excuse to get wasted. Airlines should be focused on safety, not serving booze to drunks.
I used to think in-flight alcohol service was mostly harmless, but after seeing and reading of more incidents like this, I’m wondering if it’s worth it. Why does anyone really need multiple drinks on a five-hour flight? I do like the idea of a one or two drink max even in first class. But then it comes down to being about the money.
Any sign at all you’re intoxicated then you’re cut off. Period. There, fixed it for them…
Best Regards
Airlines claim they have strict alcohol policies, but this shows just how little they actually enforce them. If a passenger was already acting strange and flight attendants kept serving him, that’s on the airline. They can’t just look the other way until something bad happens.
Yup, looks like Alaska is going to eat this law suit. Unfortunate, but you’re right, he should have been cut off Way before this happened.