Passenger Fined For Urinating in Cup On Flight

A man has been charged and fined after he was caught urinating in a cup on a flight next to passengers. The 53-year-old was removed from a flight from Auckland at Sydney Airport in December after receiving a report the man had urinated into a cup while in his seat, Stuff reported.

Australian Federal Police told Stuff Travel that the man was charged with acting in an offensive or disorderly manner affecting safety, contrary to section 91.525(4) of the Civil Aviation Safety Regulations 1998 (Cth). The matter was heard in the Downing Centre Local Court on Thursday, 21 February. The man was fined $600. A mother and daughter who were on the flight next to the man told Stuff Travel they were left “humiliated”.

Passenger Holly was flying with her 15-year-old daughter from Auckland to Sydney to visit Holly’s sister. They sat in the middle and aisle seats, with the man sitting at the window. Holly said that when they landed in Sydney, they did not have a gate, so the plane sat on the tarmac for 20 minutes or so.

The engine had been turned off, so it was much quieter while they waited. “We heard him do it [urinate]. There was no mistaking what the sound was and I just looked straight at my daughter and my daughter looked straight at me. It was very obvious what was happening.

“So yeah he pulled his naked penis out next to us at least three times."

“That just makes my skin crawl.”

She and her daughter went to the back of the plane and told the flight attendant what had happened. “And because I guess we had moved, he then got up after us and carried another full cup. I guess his intention was to pour it out in the toilet. Then as he was walking, he was obviously quite drunk by this point; he spilt a good amount of his urine onto the flight attendant at the end of the plane as well because he tripped.

“So then he went into the toilet, we had told them obviously what had happened, or what we thought had happened, and then it was kind of solidified by the fact that he had this cup of urine and had spilt half of that on her.

“When he came out of the bathroom, the crew pulled him aside and essentially, I guess, asked him not to do that any more.” Holly said the plane was then further delayed to wait for the Australian Federal Police to arrive. “We were humiliated by being escorted off the plane. “I said, no, I don't want to make a police complaint. I want to go home and get off this plane.” She did, however, give a statement but said since then, she had not heard from the police. After making a complaint to Air New Zealand, Holly said she only received an automatic, ‘thank you for your complaint' message.

After hearing nothing more, she submitted three more complaints over a number of weeks. An email was sent to Holly by Air New Zealand on Tuesday, three months after the incident, saying compensation was not an option. She has since been offered a gift basket. “I understand and accept totally that they can't control passengers, but I do think that the crew should have noticed he was drinking. I do think that the crew should not have put us or subjected us to being police escorted off the plane. “I think they're not responsible for his behaviour, but they are responsible for their customer service.” “I want to be able to show my daughter that this is actually so abnormal. Look how above and beyond they've gone to apologise. I found that really odd.” Holly said her daughter now feels uncomfortable flying alone, jeopardising her school holiday plans to visit her aunty.

“My daughter won't fly alone because she's absolutely terrified that she's not safe.” Chief operational integrity and safety officer David Morgan said he “can’t comment on this specific incident.” “However, if behaviour like this were to happen on our aircraft, our normal process would be to call the local law enforcement agencies and do our own internal investigations. Unless there were exceptional circumstances, this sort of abhorrent behaviour would lead to the passenger being banned.”

Morgan said Air New Zealand issues between five to 10 ban letters to customers each month for a range of disruptive and unacceptable behaviours, repeated failure to follow crew instructions and intoxication. “We will not stand for abhorrent behaviour that impacts other customers and our staff.

It’s frustrating for us to have to deal with behaviour like this from a small number of people when most of our passengers are fantastic.

“We apologise to any customers who have experienced poor behaviour from a fellow passenger and would like to reassure our customers we take issues like this seriously.” Coincidentally, December 30, 2023 is the same day a New Zealand couple flew with Qantas from Bangkok to Sydney sitting in seats covered in a child’s urine. They initially thought it was water, but when they discovered a pair of children’s underwear under the seat they put two and two together. After a back and forth, Qantas refunded the couple