AA's "Fat Flier" Got Whole Row

Hmm...I wonder how he fit through the metal detector.

I am seriously amazed at the amount of people who keep commenting thinking he's abnormally tall. How is it not obvious to you that he's sitting on the armrest?!

HOLY JESUS CHRIST ! ! !

If we're taking nominations for the epitome of American-ness, I vote for the amazing amounts of privilege being thrown around in these threads. Wow.

Are you fat?

No?

Have you been outside of...America?

Why do you hate this guy? He's not a thing, he's a person. He's probably got some kind of endocrine disease. Look at his height.

I weigh 100lbs and I subsidize average-weight people every time I fly. It's no big deal. That's how the system should work: Everybody pays the same for a ticket. Part of the cost covers the expense of accommodating people with special needs. You never know who that's going to be. We're all going to be old and feeble one day if we live long enough, anyone can become disabled or sick.

Please stop throwing up your meals. You will feel better about yourself.

P90x is the shit.... go do it

I wonder if these comments would be as disgusting and rude if the guy was over-height instead of over-weight.

Airplane seats have steadily shrunk in both width and legroom and the financial crises in the airline industry have accelerated rate at which personal space is shrinking. And while Americans are the fattest people in the world, percentage-wise, there is a significant number of the populous who are truly "big-boned" or suffer from diseases such as hypothyroidism and Cushing's disease.

There is only one domestic airline that I know of (Spirit) that offers any choices in seats besides a business- or first-class upgrade (upgrades that cost three times the price of a coach fare). If more airlines offered reasonably-priced seat options for those of larger frame, they might avoid embarrassment to both their companies and their customers.

i agree. my mom's a surgeon whos patients are morbidly obese to a point where all else has failed and surgery is their last and only option. i used to see patients cry ouf of fear of dying young because of their weight, and cry because they're so desperate to be healthier and have a thinner body. they oftentimes go into a deep depression. many times diet is beyond their control and they have poor genes coupled with hypothyroidism that says they metabolize food at a far slower rate than normal. i actually feel bad for this guy. imagine the stares, the whispers, the rumors people start as he walks around every day of his life.

and no, i'm 5'11", 155lbs, hardly fat at all for those of you waiting say 'oh, you're probably a fat ass.'

Then you probably used to be a fat ass. Gothamist commenters just don't like fat people, period.

$30 more for more legroom is pretty reasonable to me.

You are obviously a fat ass.

If you're so incredibly obese that you have to remove the back of your car seat, there aren't a lot of ways for airlines or anyone else to discretely get around the 'elephant in the room'. Blind people don't drive, deaf people don't work as DJs and massively fat people shouldn't fly.

He's sitting on the armrest, which is why he's a head taller than the other guy.

This guy is more like a giant than fat. Look at how much taller in the seat than the guy next to him. Fatness doesn't make you taller.

Also the article says the guy had two seats. Does it look like he's sitting in two seats you in the picture? Nope.

two MORE seats, not two seats.

Quick question. When a football team travels by air, how do they charge the linesmen? Albeit they are not flabby fat, but there are some serious supersized dudes on the team. 6'-6" and 370 isn't your normal prom queen size.

Common sense FAIL. Football teams fly on their own planes.

not all, they charter the same planes we fly on, just to get ouf of the 'commercial' flight status and moved to 'charter' status; it lets them circumvent the height safety rules which state a max of about 6'6", not that THAT many footballers would be that tall or more.

Do they get frequent flier miles? Who pays for their tickets? Is smoking allowed on board? Do they have meals served?

They get hookers and blow in First Round Draft, training table and beer cooler in Salary Cap, and backed up lavatory with empty Cristal bottles rolling under the seats in Waiver.

Nanny, I wasn't referring to the local teams only. I was speaking in general terms about football teams, college and pro.

Hm, PC description is "calorically challenged", not fat. Tsk, Tsk! I am surprised the PC police did not catch this. Remember, morbidly obese people are protected under the ADA, they are considered to be "disabled". If the airline did not make room for him, he could have sued for discrimination. Gluttony is a right. What a wonderful society.

Duh.

Fine, i'll go with disability thing(in the sense the airlines wanted to avoid a suit) but, what about the people stuck, literally, next to him, are they entitled to sue too for paying for a seat and getting 1/4 of it cause his inconsiderate ass was spilled over into it?

Just a reminder - NEVER refer directly to the PC Police or our policies. We'll be at your cubicle shortly, sir.

was this flight during the Thanksgiving holiday?

Wonderful.

Holy fuck at that photo. True symbol of America.

Come on people. Stop being such downers. At least all his neighbors had a reliable flotation device in case of emergency.

It's definitely a photoshop job. Look at the outline of his shirt/body and its sharpness compared to the individual next to him and the rest of the cabin which are a lot softer.

dude it's a cell phone camera picture, it's gonna be crappy. this was an actual flight- unless they 'investigated' some other flight with some other fat guy.

Holy smokes you are right. It's not photoshopped. I took a copy of the image and opened it up in photoshop and lightened it a bit, zoomed in and unless the individual who posted the image is a photoshop wizard it sure looks like the real thing.

Even his calves are fat.

I get grief on an airline if my foot goes out into the aisle. I believe down in the cargo hole is where they should place these individuals.

Good thing you were using NCIS software to auto-Go-Go-Gadget enhance!

They should have stuck him in the cargo hold with the other animals - no sympathy for him whatsoever. There are parts of this guy's body that haven't even been introduced to soap.

Pictures like this are like ammonia: repugnant, yet strangely clarifying.

You did NOT come up with that one all on your own....................did ya?

Ha! As someone who once sat in the middle seat, between a normal adult male (in the aisle seat) and a woman who needed a seat belt extender (she was by the window), I wish the flight attendants on that flight thought about bumping the lady to a later flight. It was an uncomfortable 4 hours.

And the mega-fatties wonder why some folks can get hostile.

Can you imagine the damage he did in the bathroom - if he could even fit...

It isn't polite to ask a morbidly obese person how they wipe their ass.

Why, a rag on a stick, of course!

Nor is interesting.

No way he could fit in the bathroom. Even if he did, he probably can't see what he's doing down there anyway. Any word from Richard Simmons yet ?

I guess they wear diapers.

So you're saying this isn't photoshoppery? All of those people who thought is was a "bad photoshop" job were - were wrong? I don't even know what to believe anymore.

Someone pass the jelly donuts.

I just can't get behind "fat acceptance."

Then again, call me crazy, I put the lionshare of the blame on crap like corn subsidy. I'm crazy like that. Can we get PepsiCo to pay for this guy's extra seat?

Corn subsidies are pretty much the epitome of everything that is wrong with our country.

i think reality television is the epitome of everything wrong with our culture.

I think overuse of the word epitome is the epitome of everything that is wrong with our culture.

TMZ is the epitome of everything wrong with our culture

I think culture is the epitome of reality...and corn.

Monsanto's corn babies!

Jesus christ, hopefully this is a wake up call for this guy to loose some fucking weight, its for his own good.

Airlines should charge by weight.

Agreed, they should charge by weight/miles flown. As it is I am currently subsidizing fatties every time I fly.

I think in order for an oversized person to fly. He must find another person (possibly a significant other) of equal weight and dimensions so that each could sit on the opposite sides of the aircraft so the weight would be be distributed evenly. This would assure stabilization and make the flight much safer. In the event of an emergency they would have to sing "Nearer My God To Thee" as they watched the rest of the passengers go down the slide.

Ameeeerrriiiccaaaa FUCK YEA

Yeah...but it's not just us. I was on vacation in Paris a few months ago, and saw...I swear to god...the fattest woman I have ever seen, in the tightest pink stretch pants I've ever seen a fat person wear. It was like "People of Walmart" had invaded the Champs-Élysées.

I thought for a second "oh, look, a fat American on vacation. Wonder if she flew over, or if her family sailed over on her." And then she opened her mouth and...she was definitely French. (I could tell because a croissant fell out.)

Turns out the French and British have some real super-mega-heifers too. It's certainly true that we have some, too -- but really it's a global thing these days.

It's all those cheap bon-bons at Promodes and Carrefour.

Yes, there are fat people (nearly) everywhere, but percentage-wise the U.S. has everyone else beat in the fatty category, hands down.

"American has said it has no hard-and-fast fat-flier rules."

I smiled when i read this sentence. I realize I'm skewing the whole "thoughtful commentary" thing, but I can't help it- it's Friday, and Fay Da's pastries have me feeling like a gentleman with 3 seats

mmmmm Fay Da... every day

I have sympathy for the pilot. How does he correct the plane's stability and leveling with a thing that large? He seems a lot taller than the other people in the plane. Is he sitting on the arm of the aisle chair?

he is sitting on a dozen babies and a puppy.

:)

Supersize diaster.

I cannot believe his fatness caused another passenger to be removed from the flight. I need more info- how was this justified?

it's probably not that mysterious, airline personnel asked if anyone wanted a free ticket to get bumped, happens all the time for all sorts of reasons. I took the ticket once because a guy was feeling ill and wanted both seats to recline in.

I wouldn't have expected such a request be taken seriously by the airline. I guess as long as the person paid for those extra seats? Also, it's been awhile since I've been on a flight that wasn't at capacity.

Fat bastard should pay for extra fuel too.

How the hell did he even get on? Forklift and a boom?

Do you mean he got an entire row of seats? The aisle is the empty space between the seats that he was clearly blocking in this photo.

I don't understand this either; if he got a whole row, then why is he on the armrest? This is prior to takeoff, then? It's unclear.

awesome

Er...sure, children and elderly passengers - not to mention people panicking - can slow down an evacuation. But seriously, that guy is so big, I would worry he would get lodged in the emergency exit and prevent everyone else from getting out. Seriously, he must have had to squeeze to get in the regular door, and the emergency exits are smaller.

On the positive side, if the plane crashed, this gigantic sandbag could dampen the forward impact of people a few rows back.