A “drunken, abusive” passenger was pulled off an EasyJet flight travelling to Iceland after he reportedly snapped his iPhone in half and smoked an e-cigarette on board.
The flight, which departed from Manchester, was forced to divert to Edinburgh after the passenger became disruptive and began hurling abuse at passengers and cabin crew, a witness told the Sun.
Police met the flight as it landed in the Scottish city shortly after it set off at around 4pm on Monday, with officers arresting the flyer.
The airline was praised on social media for the way crew handled the incident.
“That escalated quickly! Well done to easyJet though. Zero Tolerance!!
“Now waiting at Edinburgh airport after forced landing and ejection of a drunken, aggressive passenger.”
But another user, Annie Willo, was concerned for her daughter who was on the flight.
“My 19 yr old daughter was on that flight. Scary,” she tweeted.
“Well done EasyJet. I do wonder tho how someone so obviously drunk can be allowed on in the first place?”
The flight left Edinburgh airport at 6.43pm and landed in Keflavik at 8.44pm, nearly two hours after it was scheduled to land.
The airline said in a statement: “EasyJet can confirm that flight EZY1805 from Manchester to Keflavik was required to divert to Edinburgh and was met by police on arrival due to a passenger behaving disruptively.
“EasyJet’s cabin crew are trained to assess and evaluate all situations and to act quickly and appropriately to ensure that the safety of the flight and other passengers is not compromised at any time.
“Whilst such incidents are rare we take them very seriously and do not tolerate abusive or threatening behaviour onboard.”