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Muslim passengers ousted from flight due to ’suspicious’ remark

Nine Muslim men, women and children were ordered off an AirTran Airways flight Thursday after other passengers reported overhearing suspicious talk.

On the Florida-bound plane departing Thursday from Washington, D.C., the conversation that aroused suspicions, but turned out to be misconstrued, began when one couple in the group started chatting about safety on the plane.

“My brother and his wife were discussing some aspect of airport security. The only thing my brother said was, ‘Wow, the jets are right next to my window.’ I think they were remarking about safety,” Kashif Irfan told the Washington Post.

Besides Irfan, an anesthesiologist who lives in Virginia, the passengers removed from the flight included Irfan’s wife and sister-in-law, as well as Irfan’s brother, who is a lawyer, and his wife. The doctor’s three children and a family friend were also among the group, which was headed to a religious retreat in Florida, according to the Associated Press.

Irfan said he feels his group was profiled because of its traditional Muslim appearance, according to the Washington Post article. The men in the group were bearded, and the women wore head scarves.

All 104 passengers were ordered off the plane to be re-screened, and all but the nine were allowed back on the flight, which departed two hours late. The nine passengers were subsequently cleared by federal agents, but were unable to book another AirTran flight to their destination, according to AP, though they did eventually reach Florida via a US Airways flight. The Transportation Security Administration said the AirTran pilot acted appropriately in responding to concerns, according to the reports.

– Susan Derby, Special to the Los Angeles Times

This entry was posted on Friday, January 2, 2009 at 11:05 am by Susan Derby and is filed under Airline travel, California, News, Tips & Advice. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site.

2 Comments on “Muslim passengers ousted from flight due to ’suspicious’ remark”

bob Says:
January 2nd, 2009 at 12:36 pm
“Muslims,” or, “Muslim-Americans”???

I don’t understand. Why are almost all current news media identifying these unfortunate people as “Muslims” in their headlines?? Had they been, for example, US citizens who were Catholic or Jewish, would they have been identified by their religious affiliations - “Jews Escorted Off Plane.”
Especially disconcerting is that we often only read a news story’s headline.
My personal experience interacting with the TSA ‘officers’ since 9-11 is that no small number see themselves as “Wyatt Earp” or “Elliot Ness” - all important lawmen saving the country - and, often treat anyone and everyone with disrespectful impunity. My tax dollars pays for this? Gosh, we might as well live in China or Zimbabwe.
Jordan Says:
January 2nd, 2009 at 3:29 pm
What a difficult situation. On the one hand, if I heard someone say something like “oh, it’ll be safer here in case there’s an accident” I would definitely be concerned. Now, if the passengers weren’t Muslim, would the situation be the same? I don’t think so.