A United Airlines flight passenger wearing a red thong on his face instead of a mask was forced to disembark before taking off from Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
The 38-year-old man claimed on the local television channel NBC2 that he wanted to show in this way the "absurdity" of this rule, since passengers must wear a mask inside the plane to protect themselves from Covid-19, but they are allowed to take it out to eat and drink.
A video taken by another passenger shows the crew informing the 38-year-old that he can not stay inside the aircraft if he insists on wearing the thong on his face. After a discussion, the man retreats and gets up from his seat. In an interview with NBC2, he compared himself to Rosa Parks, the African-American woman's symbol of the civil rights struggle, who in 1955 refused to give her seat on the bus to a white man, challenging the laws of racial segregation. of that time.
"In this country, every change is caused by ordinary people. Rosa Parks was not famous. "It changed the course of history," the 38-year-old man seriously explained.
"The customer did not comply with federal mask regulations and we thank our crew for the problem on the ground before take-off, preventing a possible in-flight disturbance," United Airlines said in a statement. media.
(KYPE-APE-BPE-AFP / GSA / AHR)