Disabled woman slams budget airline after being ‘forced to crawl off flight’

‘It was extremely humiliating,’ says wheelchair user

Video taken by Ms Elford shows Natalie Curtis pulling herself along the plane floor (Natalie Curtis/Sunrise Australia)

A wheelchair user from Queensland, Australia has slammed budget airline Jetstar after she says she was forced to “crawl off” her flight.

Natalie Curtis was flying from Singapore to Bangkok when the incident happened.

Ms Curtis told Australia’s Sunrise programme that Jetstar had provided her with an “aisle wheelchair” in order to board her plane free of charge, but when she arrived in Bangkok she was told she would have to pay to use a similar device in order to deplane.

She says she felt this was unjust. “I didn’t really comprehend it and I was like, ‘No, I’m not paying to be able to get off this plane’,” she told presenters.

Ms Curtis says she had no alternative but to get on the ground and drag herself along the plane aisle to the front, where she could reach her own wheelchair.

“It was extremely humiliating,” she told Sunrise.

Ms Curtis was travelling with a friend, Natasha Elford, who had a knee injury and could not carry her off the aircraft.

“My first instinct was I was pretty much gutted. I was like, ‘Is this actually happening’?” Ms Elford told Sunrise.

“I couldn’t physically lift her, so I felt really hopeless and I couldn’t believe this was really happening.”

She accused the flight attendants of failing to help the pair, saying the crew “didn’t really try do anything”.

A Jetstar spokesperson said the airline had contacted Ms Curtis to apologise.

”We unreservedly apologise to Ms. Curtis for her recent experience while travelling with us. We are committed to providing a safe and comfortable travel experience for all our customers, including those requiring specific assistance.

“Regrettably, this was not the case for Ms Curtis following a miscommunication that resulted in the delay of an aisle chair being made available at the gate on arrival and we are looking into what happened as a matter of urgency.

“At no point was an aisle chair withheld due to a request for payment. Our customer team has contacted Ms. Curtis to better understand her experience and to offer her a refund, as well as additional compensation.”

They emphasised that Jetstar staff do not charge for using an aisle wheelchair, adding that an investigation into the matter had found that there was a language barrier issue leading to the misunderstanding about a fee.

Several airlines and airports have been accused of poor service quality for wheelchair users in recent months, as the aviation industry responds to the resurgence of post-pandemic travel.

A Jet2 passenger said she was “humiliated” in August when a pilot told her plane full of passengers that she was the reason for the delay to their flight.

In October, another woman who uses a wheelchair went viral after she had to drag herself to the toilet on a plane, alleging that airline staff told her she should have worn a nappy.