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This is probably apocryphal, but it's a great story, anyway. An employee for Ansett Australia (Airlines), who happened to have the last name of Gay, got on a plane recently using the company’s ‘Free Flight’ offer for staff. However, when Mr Gay tried to take his seat, he found it being occupied by a fare paying passenger. So, not to make a fuss, he simply chose another seat. Unknown to Mr Gay, another Ansett flight at the airport experienced mechanical problems. The passengers of this flight were being re-routed to various other aeroplanes. A few were put on Mr Gay’s flight and anyone who was holding a ‘free’ ticket was being ‘bumped’. Ansett officials, armed with a list of these free ticket holders boarded the plane to remove them in favour of fare paying passengers. Of course, our Mr Gay was not sitting in his assigned seat as you may remember, so when the ticket agent approached the seat where Mr Gay was supposed to be sitting, she asked a startled customer “Are you Gay?”. The man, shyly nodded that he was, at which point she demanded “Then you have to get off the plane.” Mr Gay, overhearing what the agent had said, tried to clear up the situation: “You’ve got the wrong man, I’m Gay!”. This caused an angry third passenger to yell “Hell, I’m gay too! They can’t kick us all off!”. More and more passengers began yelling that Ansett had no right to remove gays from their flights. Ansett have refused to comment on the incident. (edited version of version on http://craigslol.com/australia...nger-off-the-flight/) Build a man a fire and he's warm for a day. Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life. | ||
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Arnie, that is hilarious! I tried looking it up on Snopes. I found the earliest report of it occurred in 1995, and therefore it was archived. I couldn't find it. I did find this link, though. | |||
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I notice that gives a more likely date as Ansett went bust in 2002. However, the airline has transmogrified to Qantas. It's still highly unlikely to be true, though. Build a man a fire and he's warm for a day. Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life. | |||
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Unlikely to be true, but so funny! Love that word "transmogrified!" | |||
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Which I am not sure is the right one in this case, tongue-rollingly satisfying though it is. Has Ansett changed completely its nature and appearance (as might a caterpiillar when becoming a moth) - or has it simply evolved? Richard English | |||
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Changed completely. In one version of the story it's Ansett, in the other it's Qantas. Both are (or was in the case of the former) Australian airlines, but they were different companies. Actually, since Kalleh's link points to an earlier post (2000 whereas mine was dated 2009) perhaps the name of the company was changed from Qantas to Ansett for some reason. Build a man a fire and he's warm for a day. Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life. | |||
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