Is it my imagination, or are air travelers getting angrier at each other?

Is it my imagination, or are air travelers getting angrier at each other?

By Christopher Elliott

It is not, say passengers like Leigh Shulman, who admits she almost lost her cool as she boarded a recent flight. She had just broken her ankle and was hobbling around the airport, one baby step at a time.

“Other travelers were pushing me around,” she says. “They apparently didn’t notice the boot.”

Shulman felt her blood pressure rising and it stayed that way for the duration of the journey. “I was pissed off for hours,” she admits. She blames a combination of poor airport design, indifferent airlines and increasingly selfish passengers.

This will probably be the busiest summer for air travel in the United States just as it was last year. That means planes will be packed to capacity. We’ll feel like sardines in a can. (Related: Air travel sure has changed — but you ain’t seen nothing yet!)

It’s a tinderbox just waiting for a spark, according to experts.

Because of all this, travelers are more anxious, stressed out and overtired than at any time since the pandemic, says Jeremy Murchland, president of Seven Corners, a travel insurance company.

“To cope with that stress, they’re lashing out in inappropriate ways,” he says.

Shulman, a writing coach and public speaker, says she resisted the urge to take a swing at one of her fellow passengers, despite being jostled around. (Related: Is air travel getting better? Here are the surprising reasons it is.)

“I took a few deep breaths,” she says. “Then I boarded the flight.”

It doesn’t always end that way.

Angry air traveler incidents are making headlines again

There have been so many incidents of angry air travelers that it’s hard to compile a highlight reel. But here goes:

• How about the passenger on a Frontier Airlines flight who refused to comply with the crew’s instructionswhen sitting in an exit row? After a loud confrontation, law enforcement escorted her off the plane.

• Or the couple who recently got into a loud argument on a United Airlines flight from London to Newark. When flight attendants asked them to calm down, they turned belligerent and the male passenger threatened to “mess up the plane.” He was arrested and fined $20,638 after the flight had to be diverted to Bangor, Maine.

• Rapper Sandra “Pepa” Denton said she was escorted off a Southwest Airlines flight after a disagreement over seating. And Terrell Davis, the NFL Hall of Famer, was led off a United Airlines flight in handcuffs following an exchange with a flight attendant. (United has apologized to Davis and is investigating the incident.)

The statistics also paint a troubling picture. The Federal Aviation Administration reports that inflight incidents remain elevated and “recent increases show there remains more work to do,” it adds. (Overall, unruly passenger incidents appear to be trending downward after the pandemic.)

What’s behind the angry air travelers?

So what’s making airline passengers so crabby? It comes down to three things, experts say.

Manners have gone out the window

Let’s not mince words: People are ruder than ever, and that antisocial behavior is amplified when you’re sitting in a pressurized aluminum tube with nowhere to go. Manners are disintegrating across society, not just at the airport. But there’s one thing that sustains this unacceptable behavior, according to etiquette expert Rosalinda Oropeza Randall. “There are no consequences,” she says. It’s true, many incidents go unreported because they’re just little temper tantrums. (Related: Here are the air travel secrets I want to share with you.)

Flying is even more stressful than usual

Travel is more of a hassle than ever. Fuller flights and less storage space make flying even more stressful than at any time in recent memory. The number of inflight incidents reported to the Federal Aviation Administration remains elevated when compared to pre-pandemic levels. And the number of high-profile altercations between flight attendants and passengers seems to multiply by the week. No two ways about it — air travel is putting us under a lot of pressure. (Here’s our guide to booking an airline ticket.)

Junk fees are multiplying

“A big factor in consumers losing their tempers is the feeling that they are getting nickel and dimed at every turn,” says Beth Walter, who teaches business communication at Carnegie Mellon University’s Tepper School of Business. She says extra costs for luggage and seat assignments make passengers upset. “No one likes hidden fees, and if they pop up during trips they can easily trigger the temper of a stressed-out, exhausted traveler who has been preparing for their summer vacation since last year and is expecting that everything goes according to plan,” she adds.

What you can do to keep your cool this summer

Look, I’m not gonna lie. The best way to stay calm this summer is to find another way to get there or to just stay home.

Travelers want to have it all — a great trip with zero stress. That’s impossible. I travel constantly and I always experience anxiety in the same places — the security checkpoint, at customs, before boarding, and at the luggage conveyor belt.

Shulman, the passenger with the broken ankle, has the right idea, according to Colleen Newvine, who teaches a stress management workshop.

“Breathe slowly and deeply, exhaling twice as long as you take for your inhale, to help tell your nervous system that you’re safe,” she says.

What if someone is being rude to you? Don’t retaliate, advises etiquette expert Nick Leighton.

“Never respond to rudeness with more rudeness,” he says.

That just leads to an escalation — and then you’ll be in my next highlight reel. Instead, Leighton says you should assume an etiquette crime isn’t being committed intentionally and deliberately. Give your fellow passengers the benefit of the doubt, and you will find a solution.

Finally, remember to pack your manners. That’s the advice of Thomas Plante, a psychology professor at Santa Clara University.

“It all comes down to respect and compassion,” he told me. “Typically, escalating tensions can be diminished if you show both respect and compassion to the person who is getting upset.” Yes, even on a plane, or in a crowded airport, or at an overcrowded luggage carousel.

Airlines have to defuse this summer bomb

If it seems like I’m blaming passengers for the escalation of anger, let me correct you: I’m not. The U.S. airline industry bears a lot of the responsibility for creating this problem. It can easily defuse this summer bomb.

How? Just give passengers a little more personal space by moving the seats farther apart instead of packing travelers in like sardines. Remove the junk fees that irritate travelers. Maybe give flight attendants a little more customer service training instead of combat training. But at a time when airline profitability is waning, good luck with getting that.

If airlines started treating us with respect and compassion, maybe we would start behaving with respect and compassion.

Oh, I know. Dream on. But someone had to say it.

Christopher Elliott

Christopher Elliott is the founder of Elliott Advocacy, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that empowers consumers to solve their problems and helps those who can't. He's the author of numerous books on consumer advocacy and writes three nationally syndicated columns. He also publishes the Elliott Report, a news site for consumers, and Elliott Confidential, a critically acclaimed newsletter about customer service. If you have a consumer problem you can't solve, contact him directly through his advocacy website. You can also follow him on X, Facebook, and LinkedIn, or sign up for his daily newsletter.